Varsity boss escapes jail term in court battle with students

Jomo Kenyatta University of Science and Technology (JKUAT) vice-chancellor has been saved from a jail term in a case filed by students left out of a graduation a year ago.

Justice Anyara Emukule ruled that Vice Chancellor Mabel Imbuga did not act in contempt of court.

Eighty-three engineering students from Technical University of Mombasa (TUM), which was a constituent college of JKUAT, had sued both institutions for denying them the all-important opportunity to graduate last year.

TUM had confirmed that the 83 were indeed JKUAT students who studied at the Mombasa campus from 2009 and had undertaken undergraduate courses in engineering.

But the students wanted TUM compelled to forward their names to JKUAT for inclusion in the graduation list after the latter refused to let them graduate.

And Justice Mary Kasango ruled in 2015 that it was indeed their right to graduate and hence ordered JKUAT to accord them all the necessary assistance.

ORDER IGNORED

However, Prof Imbuga and JKUAT Chief Legal Officer Vivian Waithaka ignored the order and were cited for acting in contempt of court.

The two challenged the students’ case while seeking that the order be reviewed, arguing that JKUAT had no sufficient time to package all information or data when the students sued them.

It claimed that it would not bar them from graduating as long as they complete their courses as prescribed by the university’s senate, which was not satisfied with their earlier results.

JKUAT also claimed that if the two officers were to be jailed, the institution would lose its international academic reputation.

“In the circumstances, I am unable to say that JKUAT or its personnel acted in contempt of the court’s order. I think, they were in a dilemma and purported to carry out the court’s orders by issuing degrees,” Justice Emukule said.

The judge ruled that out of the 83, only 64 who opt to complete their course be admitted by JKUAT/TUM without being charged any tuition fees.

The judge ordered that both JKUAT and TUM act in good faith and facilitate the registration of the students without undue technicalities.

The judge also ordered that JKUAT/TUM give the students full credit for the courses they have already taken and examined on, as well as let them graduate after successfully completing their studies.

'PING-PONG GAME'

The judge said the conditions had to be set since the two institutions took long to settle the differences between them that resulted in the long legal battle.

“The degrees studied by these students are critical to the technological and industrial development of our country, region and continent; it is therefore paramount that they are ultimately earned, not court transmitted since the loser is not JKUAT,” the judge ruled.

According to the students, JKUAT prepared and approved the syllabus that lecturers taught them though TUM had not been accredited by the Engineering Registration Board.

The students had claimed that they had not received information regarding the graduation from TUM or JKUAT at the time they sued in June 2015.

“It is a pity that this ping-pong and sea-saw game has been going on for too long between JKUAT and its child TUM; obviously when elephants fight it is the grass which suffers,” the judge said.

The students and the institutions will now have to confirm to the court that they have complied with the verdict by the end of March next year.