The recently formed Petitions Committee heard its second set of petitioners on Wednesday evening, listening to presentations by former police sergeant Charles
Zammit and former PhD student and assistant lecturer at the University of Malta Gaetano Vella.

Mr Vella accused the University of Malta of unfairly denying him a PhD degree even though his examiners – among whom were two foreign experts in his field, as well as current Pro-Rector Godfrey Baldacchino and Dr Michael Briguglio – had unanimously recommended him for the award of the PhD after reading his thesis and interviewing him in athree-hour viva voce examination.

The petitioner explained the lengthy PhD evaluation process, quoting liberally from the reports presented by the cited examiners, who described his study of the internet’s effect on domestic life, carried out within the Department of Sociology, as pioneering and “a phenomenal piece of work.”

After being informally told by the board chairperson that he would be recommended for the award of a doctoral degree and asked to make only
minor changes, he was summoned to a second viva voce examination with the object of “possibly” conferring the lesser degree of MPhil instead.

Mr Vella’s appeals to both the University Council and its Senate had yielded no solution, even though the Registrar denied him the opportunity to address
these bodies in person, he said, and even though the individual members of both bodies – of whom he had met the vast majority in person to explain his case – had indicated to him that they believed him to be in the right.

The council, he said, had “washed its hands” of the matter, considering it to be an academic issue, even though all the academic documentation for the award of the degree was in place.

As a compromise, the Senate proposed that his viva voce be carried out from scratch, an option which he considered futile.

Furthermore, after he presented his case to the former Commissioner for Education within the Ombudsman’s office, the Ombudsman penned athe report which was incorrect and misrepresentative, he said, and which went as far as to misquote an examiner’s report.

He learned at a later stage that a Pro-Rector from the university had phoned the Malta Government Scholarships Scheme office to inquire whether his data and findings could be used and published as part of the research of another student.

Since the Commissioner for Education within the Ombudsman’s office had been replaced in the interim, he asked the Petitions Committee to request the reconsideration of his case. He also asked the Committee to request council to revisit its decision.

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