Release students or else, ABM told

BAME PIET
Staff Writer | Friday July 25, 2008 00:00

 

The 22 students, majority of whom were pursuing Diploma in Accounting and Finance, have engaged the services of Boko, Motlhala, Rabashwa, Ketshabile Attorneys instructing ABM University College registrar to write letters of release.

In a letter written to the college yesterday, the lawyers sternly warn that the refusal is unlawful and malicious. 'It is calculated to frustrate the efforts engaged by the students and the Department of Student Placement to address the plight of these students,' charged the letter. It says that the students' plight is a result of a clear breach of contractual obligations to the students and their sponsor on the part of ABM. It adds that it's a result of ABM's failure to remedy the breach when it was pointed to them.

'You are also aware that your continuing refusal to issue the release letters occasions yet further prejudice on these students and their sponsor. In the circumstances we would like to advise that our clients will look to you for damages to address the prejudice occasioned by your conduct and compounded by your refusal to issue the release letters,' the attorneys warned. 

They further ordered the institution to issue release letters by close of business today or they would make an urgent application to seek a court order compelling ABM to issue the letters.

'We should also indicate to you that in the event we proceed to court on this matter we shall also seek costs on a punitive scale against you as we regard your conduct as not only palpably unlawful but also extremely egregious,' the letter warned.

The attorneys reveal that ever since commencement of their studies the students have had countless problems, which were brought to the institution's management.

No action was taken to remedy the problems, they allege, and the students then took their grievances up with the Department of Student Placement and Welfare (DSPW).  Thereafter the students decided to find alternative institutions, which admitted them for the programmes they were registered for at ABM.  DSPW did not object.

Among their complaints the students allege that ABM has a serious problem of high turnover of lecturers with slow replacements, which disadvantages them; the college is too small for the number of students and that it is not fully equipped; the institution does not provide Internet facilities and this undermines students' learning and research. 'The institution is shockingly unresponsive to the grievances the students have consistently raised with its management and it has taken absolutely no action to address the situation,' the attorneys said in another letter written to the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Education and Skills Development.

They wondered how ABM could have been approved and recognised by government for the provision of tertiary education.
'Any amount expended in sponsoring students to such an institution amounts to an irresponsible waste of resources and may only indicate that government is too willing to dump students with any institution without regard to the quality of programmes at such institution,' the letter hints.

Attempts to get a comment from ABM University College were futile. Public relations officer Kefilwe Mokokomane was said to be on sick leave while the executive director was not available at the time of going to press.