Medical school to stay shut

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Published Jul 31, 2017

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The Nelson R Mandela Medical School will stay shut until issues raised by students, including a demand for a forensic report into the sale of places, are resolved. 

The SRC at the school handed over a memorandum during mass action that shut down the university on Friday.

SRC president Nkosinathi Ndebele said yesterday they would have a meeting with university management on Monday to discuss concerns about the integrity of their pending qualifications from the school, which has been marred by the sale of places to “undeserving students”. 

Three people, believed to be part of a syndicate, were arrested in May for allegedly selling places at the school for up to R500 000. They are out on bail. The matter is due back in court at the end of August. 

More arrests are said to be imminent as UKZN staff were fingered as part of the syndicate. 

Ndebele questioned why no action had been taken and demanded to see the KPMG report into the issue. 

“The university has always said they are co-operating with the Hawks, yet they only submitted the KPMG report to the Hawks on Thursday. It took them two months to hand over the report that triggered the investigation.”

Ndebele said it did not bode well for their future for the university to be associated with such negativity. 

He said another big concern was plans for the placement of students at ill-equipped medical facilities for some of their modules. 

“There are problems in facilities in Durban; now imagine in areas of the periphery. We have been rotating between Empangeni and Pietermaritzburg; now they want to add Madadeni (in Newcastle), Stanger and Port Shepstone. 

“Facilities are not well resourced and we don’t trust that consultants will be willing to teach us. Until the university sorts out its problems with the Department of Health, we cannot go there,” said Ndebele. 

The SRC also questioned the presence of a disproportionate number of medical students from Cuba at the school. 

It said between 150 and 250 were placed at UKZN, while other medical schools took about 20 each, and these students performed poorly because there was not enough mentoring. 

Leadership

Without a dean, Ndebele said the gaps in leadership at the school were showing. 

In communication to students, Professor Rob Slotow, the deputy vice-chancellor at the College of Health Sciences and acting dean at the school of medicine, confirmed receipt of the SRC’s memorandum, and that learning at the medical school, including clinical teaching in hospitals, would be suspended. 

Ndebele said they would not be satisfied with promises of resolutions, but wanted “actual change” before they would go back to class. 

“We can’t keep sitting back when we get a promise that it will be resolved, and then it isn’t.  There will be no teaching at the medical school until our issues are resolved, we are not backing down on that one.”

The Mercury

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