The Peninsula Newspaper
Wednesday, 14 March 2012 00:56
The cancerous spread of fictive degrees and certificates has even hit the media field institutions “Why should it be an exception”.
One of our Arab colleagues distributed sweets for obtaining a master’s degree from a foreign university. Through a link on the web he had been able to equate his 15 years diploma (not even a university degree) by falsely stating the number of years of experience without studying, passing exams or writing a dissertation or thesis.
He informed us that he was preparing to get a doctorate degree in the upcoming months if he submitted a thesis including 15 thousand words or about 30 pages written either in Arabic or its translation. A certified doctorate degree will be sent to him by mail when he pays the required fees!
(1) The Saudi daily Al-Sharq recorded in a thorough report on the prevalence of fictive degrees and certificates and targeting of Gulf States, citizens and residents especially the Arab communities, over 7,000 people from Arab and Gulf States received academic degrees from fictive and unrecognised universities. The concerned authorities in these countries warned their citizens of these fake certificates.
The daily newspaper also reported about 1400 fake universities in two US states considered by the higher education institutions as “untrustworthy”, and the US government warned the bodies concerned against them.
Al-Sharq disclosed the names of the unrecognised universities such as the American University in London, the University of Columbus, Dukes, Samford and others, that some of their graduates were working in public and private institutions and were proud of being holders of higher degrees.
The list of Samford University graduates alone includes more than four thousand Arab names; the majority of them are GCC citizens as well as the University of Dukes and the American University in London. The report pointed out that before the nineties it had been difficult to promote fake certificates but after the spread of the internet revolution the fake companies were able to promote them and peoples could easily access their offices.
Columbus University became a leader in the field of fictive degrees after the launch of the internet revolution in 1995. Al-Sharq found that browsers could only access its Arabic website but the French and English versions were locked. Browsers of Belford University website cannot access it provided paying $195 as fees for signing in to obtain its degree researches.
(2) Is there any difference between fictive and forged degrees? Dr Nasser Al Maiman says that both are based on fraud but their origin is different. Counterfeiting is a change made in the content of an official document such as a name of a person in a legal instrument or passport, or the currency of a country and so on. But the fictive degrees are academy certificates issued by universities that are not recognised by the sovereign authorities such as the Ministry of Education. Hence, any academic degree not recognised by the Ministry of Education is to be considered a fake degree.
With regard to the serious spread of fake degrees, Dr Rashoud Muhammad says that it is a serious epidemic recently spreading in most countries in general and in Gulf States in particular due to the sanctification and misuse of academic degrees as well as lack of deterrent penalties to reduce the spread of this type of certificate.
Obtaining a fake degree is a serious crime as well as theft, fraud and deception crimes. So we should deal seriously with fictive degrees to avoid their severe consequences on development in general and human being health in particular. Any country cannot progress or compete at international level by relying on fake degrees holders such as physicians or lawyers. It is important to notify that use of fictive titles discourage serious peoples in our country, who work hard day and night in order to obtain degrees from distinguished universities. We should not forget that the forgery, fraudulence is religiously and socially prohibited as said “Whoever cheats us does not belong to us”.
(3) The education authorities in Greece fixed ¤40,000 as the price of a doctorate degree at the American University in Athens. There are many Arab and GCC students who have been admitted to the university, but Kuwait, unlike other Gulf countries, decided to suspend the enrolment of Kuwaiti students in the undergraduate and graduate studies at American University in Athens after factitive degrees became a phenomenon. It also sent observers to several countries to detect the conditions of its students studying in those countries. The observers disclosed that (90 percent) of 4,000 universities in India lack good academic reputation and sell fake degree. The team according to Al-Qabas newspaper reported that: some banned universities seek accreditation of some prestigious Indian universities to obtain their logo and use it to approve the certificates of their graduates.
In Egypt, the regulatory authorities traced comprehensive investigations on agents who used to charge $12,000 to sell MA and PhD in the Gulf region. The investigation done by “Al Youm Al Sabei” daily disclosed that the Suez Canal University had signed a contract with the Development Academy and the US Wedo University to promote the Occupational Master’s Degree approved by the Supreme Council of Universities via its agent in Egypt to grant the occupational PhD degree. Wedo University is considered by the US accreditation foundation as a fictive university.
A Saudi specialized consultant center responsible of detecting fake and fictive degrees disclosed that the offices of foreign universities non-recognized by the Ministry of Higher Education of Saudi Arabia had raised 500 million riyals from 13 thousand citizens and residents who obtained their bachelor, master and PhD degrees from their establishment eight years ago. According to the center, the rate of fictive and fake degrees range between ten to thirty thousand riyals for Bachelor’s, master’s and doctor’s degrees, while the degrees’ rates of the unlicensed universities go up to thirty thousand riyals for the Bachelor’s degree, 45 thousand riyals for Master’s degree and between sixty thousand to ninety thousand riyals for PhDs.
(4) Qatar’s society, compared to the Arab and Gulf countries, lacks the required legislations, educational control, media campaigns and calls to amend the statute of fraudulence control to control this cancerous curse.
Though the public sector refuses to grant work permits for people lacking higher qualifications but this is not the case in the private sector.
Personally I know some of my friends and colleagues, who obtained fake certificates, are assuming important responsibilities and occupying senior posts as managers and executive officers.
They resort to the cheaper, vulgar and corrupt ways to obtain such certificates. I ask the ministries of Education and Labor how many holders of fictive and non-recognised by the Ministry of Education who occupy senior positions in the State?
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