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….calls for immediate autonomy By Leon SuseranThe Director of the University of Guyana Berbice Campus (UGBC), Professor Daizal R. Samad has said that it is essential for the Berbice Campus to be separated from its Turkeyen counterpart or division, hence a move towards autonomy. Autonomy would mean UGBC having its own administration and become a separate university. If it happens, Guyana would have two universities.He stands ready to push for autonomy and says that he can get the funding to do it, to set up student dorms and such so that students from the other counties can come to Berbice and study at what would be called ‘The University of Berbice in Guyana’ (UGBG).Prof Samad said that UG Turkeyen is nothing but “an albatross” (around UGBC’s neck) and not working. “I am, by nature, a very optimistic person, but goodness knows, I have tried to be optimistic about Turkeyen– I failed!”“I do not see any reason to be optimistic about Turkeyen at all– I have tried and I have come up short. I don’t see any changes in the near future”.Prof Daizal SamadA lot has been happening at UG Turkeyen recently as the UG Senior Staff union held protest actions a few weeks ago and clamoured for a range of issues to be fixed to make the institution more viable.There the search is still on for a Vice- Chancellor and sources have revealed to this newspaper that a few persons have been short- listed and a decision is likely to be made shortly as to the person who will take up this crucial position at the university.The position has been vacant since April 1, 2012 and advertisements were placed in the newspapers. The post was previously held by Prof. Lawrence Carrington.The Director of UGBC said that if there is not that kind of leader at the University, “we might as well throw up our hands in despair”. If that kind of leader is not found, he added, the Berbice Campus, under his leadership, might very well move “inexorably for autonomy”.“If we don’t have what is needed to lead UG,NFL Jerseys Supply, the main campus will continue down its slippery slope towards dilapidation and ineffectuality”.He questioned whether UG Turkeyen has done “one single piece of research…over the last two years– one– and I will be shutting my mouth!”UGBC DOING RESEARCHThe Berbice campus, he said, has cured plantain disease, banana disease, “we’re looking at the dead- fish syndrome; we’re looking at the worms in the [mullet] fishes; we have cured diseases in sugar cane and we are looking at the nutritional benefits of pumpkin, and those are just a few things– I am not even talking about our work in Social Work, the research going on there and in education and the research that is going to be done on the Writing Centre which we will open in two weeks”.“Those are serious, serious pieces of research; no matter where you are on the planet– Turkeyen is not doing that, so let them go and protest and strike and so on”. |
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