TANZANIA SCRAP NINE UNIVERSITIES OVER QUALITY

Dar es Salaam, TANZANIA

The Tanzania Commission for Universities (TCU) this week announced deregistration of nine universities for failing to take corrective measures aimed at improving the standard of education in their campuses.

"The deregistered universities have failed to take remedial measures given to them in 2018 to improve the standards of education they offered," said Charles Kihampa, TCU Executive Secretary.

He added: "Even if they were given more time they could not have taken the remedial steps."

The decision to deregister the universities was taken in a meeting attended by owners of the universities held on January 20, Kihampa told a news conference in the commercial capital Dar es Salaam.

The deregistered universities included the Josiah Kibira University College, Mount Meru University, International Medical and Technological University and Bagamoyo University College.

With request from the owners, TCU has also scrapped the registration of the following universities Archbishop James University College, Cardinal Rugambwa Memorial University College, the Teofilo Kisanji University Dar es Salaam Center, the St. John's University's St. Marks Campus and Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology.

In September 2018, TCU announced deregistration of two private universities for providing substandard academic services.

Equally, TCU barred a number of private universities from admitting new students after they had failed to meet required academic standards.

TCU said students who were pursuing courses in the two deregistered universities should be shifted to other colleges before the commencement of the 2019/20 academic year.

In quest for quality education, the Tanzania Universities Commission revoked the admission of 8,000 students it had earlier admitted to various universities, citing “lack of academic qualifications” in the year 2017.

The Commission released a list of continuing students from 10 universities out of 52 who it said did not meet the admission criteria.

The affected universities were: St Augustine University of Tanzania (1,046 students), St John’s University of Tanzania (968), State University of Zanzibar (966), and Mzumbe University (639).

Others were Abdulrahaman Al-Sumail Memorial University in Zanzibar (552), University of Iringa (522), Institute of Rural Development Planning (431), College of Business Education of Dodoma Campus (375), Institute of Finance Management (305) and the University of Dar es Salaam (224).