By Staff Reported
WINDHOEK – Following recent media reports about allegations of improper issuance of qualifications and improper conduct by officials of the International University of Management (IUM), the institution appointed an internal investigation committee to probe the claims.
The committee conducted various inquiries into the allegations made and engaged various stakeholders.
One of the findings was that there was no merit in the allegations but the committee recommended that Dr Ben Fuller, the IUM’s Dean of Faculty of Humanities, HIV/AIDS and Sustainable Development be called upon to show cause why he should not be charged with misconduct.
Fuller allegedly leaked information to the media, something which he has vehemently denied.
The whole saga started with Fuller questioning the authenticity of Master’s degrees conferred upon Sydney Lulanga and Verlistars Shamwazi.
According to findings made by the committee, it was provided with authenticated information relating to the qualifications of Lulanga and Shamwazi.
The committee questioned why Fuller failed to make proper inquiries and follow through before generating communications based on his perceptions.
Fuller’s behaviour was called strange and regrettable and his approach rather unfortunate.
A claim by Fuller alleging Professor Fred Opali was improperly awarded a PhD, that no research thesis was submitted by him and that it was improper for Opali to be at IUM without proper qualifications was also dismissed.
According to the findings, in New Era’s possession, there is no merit in the allegations as it was discovered Opali was duly and properly enrolled as a PhD student.
On the malicious allegations that Opali is not qualified to supervise the Master’s degree and that the committee which awards Honorary degrees is defective, the IUM investigation team also ascertained they were baseless.
Another mischievous allegation that David Akuunda plagiarised his research work for the Bachelor’s degree, that no disciplinary action was taken against him and he was allowed to register for the Master’s degree, was also dismissed.
The committee found that Fuller did not conduct a proper investigation and he made generalised and baseless claims.
The committee said that as the dean of the faculty, Fuller himself should have been able to finalise the matter pertaining to the alleged plagiarism and alleged improper qualifications with regard to the allegations against Akuunda.
They recommended an IT specialist be engaged to determine whether there were any communications generated from IUM to the media that in turn reported on the allegations without ascertaining the factuality of the reports.