Mutharika worried with reactions on his call for lecturers’ research

Government has expressed concern over negative reactions on the encouragement which the State President Professor Peter Mutharika forwarded to university lecturers of conducting research than wasting time in writing and commenting on trivial public issues.
Government has expressed concern over negative reactions on the encouragement which the State President Professor Peter Mutharika forwarded to university lecturers of conducting research than wasting time in writing and commenting on trivial public issues.

During the fundraising dinner for University of Malawi Golden Jubilee Celebrations Mutharika asked the lecturers to be engaged in rigorous research and publication for the development of this country.

He said it is high time Malawi put its universities on the world map through research and innovations.
Speaking at the fundraising dinner for University of Malawi Golden Jubilee Celebrations at Bingu International Conference Centre in Lilongwe on Saturday Mutharika said a good university is known by its research and publications.

In the statement released today and made available to radio Islam Minister of Information, Tourism and Culture Kondwani Nankhumwa said in making those remarks, Mutharika himself an accomplished scholar, was simply underlining the contribution that research universities brings to socioeconomic development of a country.

“Many similar observations have been made by other accomplished scholars world over and have never been misunderstood as an attempt to curtail freedom of speech among university lecturers or regulate academic freedoms in places of higher learning,” it reads.

For instance Nankhumwa said speaking on the importance of research in universities, Philip G Altbach, research professor and director of the Center for International Higher Education at Boston College in the United States explained that Research universities in low- and middle-income countries have crucial roles to play in developing differentiated and effective academic systems, and in making it possible for their countries to join the global knowledge society and compete in sophisticated knowledge economies.

“Students are often willing to pay higher fees because of the prestige attached to a degree from them, quality academic programmes and access to top professors,” stressed the statement.

He then said this is the reason the learned Altbach said that research universities in developing countries are at the top of the academic hierarchy and are central to the success of any modern knowledge-based economy.

Nankhumwa has therefore emphasised that understanding Mutharika differently can only be regrettable.