By Abass Jalloh
The Director of Media and Communications of the University of Sierra Leone, Dr. Tonya Musa, has dismissed as untrue graduation dates shared on social media.
“We have graduation week, but we have not yet fixed dates for graduation,” Dr. Musa said. “The university will come out with dates to inform its graduands appropriately.”
Dr. Musa said that publication of graduation dates would be the work of the management based on certain elements like the collation of degrees and later publication. “We cannot pronounce dates without doing all of that,” he said.
Last week, unverified convocation dates of the three constituent colleges – Fourah Bay College (FBC), Institute of Public Administration and Management (IPAM), College of Medicine and Allied Health Sciences (COMAHS) – were shared on social media claiming that March 5th, 12th, and 19th would be the dates for the 2021 graduation.
Asked whether the notice of COMAHS shared on social media was authentic, Dr. Musa said he had not read the mentioned release but said normally, for COMAHS, “they have swearing ceremony which is different from the congregation, and when you put that together is graduation”, adding that the swearing ceremony of COMAHS normally precedes the congregation and they normally do that at “collegiate level”.
Speaking to Politico on behalf of students, the Students’ Union President of FBC, Adama Sillah, also disregarded claims of the stated dates and said she was not aware of an authentic publication from the administration. “There is no notice concerning that yet because we have not got that from the administration,” she said. Sillah asserted that the students union is part of the administration and that matters related to students are passed onto them by the administration.
Students in the Class of 2021 awaiting convocation had expected they could have gone through the process in December last year as was stated by the university administration but which according to them was postponed due to the late start of examination as well submission and publication of grades.
Copyright © 2022 Politico Online (11/02/22)
