By Leonard Kamugisha Akida,
FORT PORTAL:
Rwenzori region has on Thursday received a Public University after Gov’t officially taken over the Mountains of the Moon University, Fort Portal.
In September 2021, Parliament in approved a motion for the takeover, four years after the university private administration had written to government to turn the university into a public institution over financial constraints.
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On Thursday January 13, 2022, the Ministry of Education entered a Memorandum of Agreement with the university board of trustees allowing government to takeover the university administration.
The State Minister for Higher Education, John Chrysostom Muyingo witnessed the signing ceremony. He said the takeover was a development in promotionof higher education in the country.
“This can now be counted among the achievements made by this government.” Muyingo said.
According to Muyingo, MMU will commence full operations as a public university on June,1,2022 .
He says that this is being done to enable all the critical remaining processes to be concluded smoothly.
With the signing of the MoA, the authority of the private university ceases and full control has now been taken over by government, including the staff.
“The Mountains of the Moon transition task force will remain as the interim authority to facilitate the constitution of the university council and acquisition of the board status among other. It is stipulated within the MOA that the current staff of the university will be notified of all the arrangements and that they will remain operating under the terms of the existing contracts issued by the private university until they have been validated by the new university council of the public university.”
The MMU staff including lecturers and non-teaching staff will soon be considered as employees of the public university.
Minister Muyingo further added that the Attorney General Kiryowa Kiwanuka will soon Gazette the institution as a public university.
He also revealed government plans to construct new structures at the university for quick expansion.
“To the people, they now have a public university in their region and will enjoy everything associated with such a privilege. Development will now extend nearer to them and will become faster because government will now come in with a big bang,” he said.
Col Tom Butime, the chairman board of trustees for the university has hailed gov’t for accepting to take over the privately-owned university.
“The university you are taking over is not an incumbered university. There have not been cases of corruption, no cases of conflict of interest, no cases of influence peddling and sectarianism. You are taking over a clean university and I can assure you that you are going to have a smooth ride,”Butime said.
The chairperson of the university’s transition task force, Prof. Dr. Pius Coxwell Achanga said the university transition taskforce agreed not to change the name as new administration comes in.
“My appointment was also to determine whether the name Mountains of the Moon University stands or be altered and we did 75 consultative engagements in the entire Rwenzori region. In every discussion, we were told to retain the name. The name will therefore not change,” Prof. Dr.Achanga said.
