Makerere University Admissions Committee has agreed to admit a group of students whose initial qualifications had been rejected by the Allied Health Professional’s Council.
The students initially graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Biomedical Sciences. However, the degree programme was not registered with the Allied Health Professional’s Council, which meant that its graduates could not obtain requisite Certificates and Licenses as registered Health Workers.
As a result, Makerere guaranteed that students would be allowed to enroll for a five-year Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery, which they would join in year three.
But during the 2017/2018 academic year admission, only 20 candidates were admitted on the basis of their performance, leaving out twelve equally qualifying candidates.
The students appealed to the University admissions committee protesting the decision. Eight of them went to Court on grounds that the College of Health Sciences ignored its statutory obligation to ensure due registration of its Bachelor of Science in Biomedical Sciences (BSB) degree programme with the medical professional body.
High Court Judge Margaret Oguli subsequently issued an order to admit the applicants to Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor Surgery for the academic year 2018/2019.
The University Admissions Committee has now approved their admission to the Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery programmes, in the next academic year which starts in August.