A former University of Fort Hare lecturer has opened a case of fraud and corruption against the head of the criminology department after his name was removed from a thesis he had supervised.
Mike Earl-Taylor is also suing the university for R100,000 for damages and has laid charges of conspiracy to commit fraud and attempted fraud and corruption against the dean, deputy dean and the manager of the social science and humanities faculty.
According to 70-year-old Earl-Taylor, who retired last December after 10 years at the university, the HOD at the criminology department, Tshimangadzo Magadze, deliberately removed his name from the thesis of a masters student that he had supervised for four years.
The student graduated at the university in May this year.Earl-Taylor said his name and that of his co-supervisor were clearly printed on the cover page of the thesis. However, he was informed that both names had been removed by Magadze who submitted the thesis to the faculty manager under his own name.
In an internal memorandum sent by Magadze to the faculty dean, he confirmed that Earl-Taylor was the rightful supervisor.“
I understand that I made an error or oversight of not writing his [Earl-Taylor] name as supervisor.
I therefore indicate that my intention was to assist the student, not to recognise the supervisor. I fully concur that Mike Earl-Taylor is the sole supervisor.” Earl-Taylor claimed this was not the only thesis Magadze had claimed to have supervised.
In another internal memorandum addressed to the dean, which was seen by the Daily Dispatch, Magadze apologised for bringing the university and the faculty into disrepute for not acknowledging a second co-supervisor in another thesis.
“This is an act of such blatant academic dishonesty, deception and plagiarism of the worst kind and should not go unpunished,” said Earl-Taylor.
Magadze referred the Dispatch to university spokesperson Khotso Moabi when approached for comment.
Moabi said the university’s legal department had been in communication with Earl-Taylor’s attorney, Netteltons Attorneys in Makhanda.
He claims the university had not seen the letter of demand that was issued. Provincial police spokesperson Captain Mali Govender confirmed a case had been opened at the Bathurst police station and transferred to Alice for further investigation...