Government disqualifies over 400 fake academic credentials of own employees

Juba, South Sudan,

June 05, 2021 – The government has intercepted and disqualified 400 academic certificates of employees working at the Ministry of General Education and Instructions.

Information Minister Michael Makuei disclosed this at a cabinet meeting convened on Friday. Most of the certificates whose authentication could not be verified were acquired from Ugandan and Kenyan institutions of learning.

The incident prompted cabinet ministers to consider the possibility of revoking academic credentials dubiously acquired by South Sudanese from various universities both within the country and across the border.

Makuei said the decision is being considered after the Ministry of General Education and Instructions has been examining university certificates of government employees and referred many of them to Uganda and Kenya for authentication, the documents turned out to be fake.

“These documents were disqualified and the number is big. In Uganda, there were over 400 certificates, diplomas, degrees, or even PhDs and master degrees,” Makuei told reporters in Juba.

Makuei said the cabinet meeting has passed the resolution to trace down, arrest, and charged those found with the forged documents before the court of law.

“All these who will be found in possession forge documents, their names should be released officially and they should be prosecuted before the court,” he said.

“Some of these people who acquired these certificates or degrees or documents through fraudulent, are the people who failed to deliver in the offices,” he said.

He added that “You find a person holding a very high degree and a very high level of document of being a Ph.D. or a master degree or a degree and if you give that person an assignment, he will not be able to deliver.”

The Cabinet directed the Ministry of General Education, Higher Education, and of Public Services to come with an appropriate mechanism to control and prevent forgery of the documents,” Makuei said.

“They should come up with a mechanism for identification of forged document and it seems that there are a group of people, Universities and other institutions of learning that hand over a certificate to people without students attending any classes,” a government spokesman said.

“If you are an honest person, you are not supposed to acquire fake documents and use them for employment only and in fact, in the course of doing that, you are harming the government and you are harming your own people and the country because you will be given an assignment in which you will not perform because you have done a study but not qualified,” he added.