Materia Medica Malaysiana

Samy Vellu Questions Motive Behind CSMU Recognition Withdrawal

Works Minister Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu Saturday ticked off the Malaysian Medical Council (MMC) for withdrawing its recognition of the Ukraine's Crimea State Medical University (CSMU) medical programme and questioned its motive for doing so.

A visibly upset Samy Vellu also demanded a proper and acceptable explanation from the MMC, saying that he would raise the matter in the Cabinet as the issue affected the future of many students.
"The MMC is not a communist politburo where everything is secret. I don't like that. You must tell the truth," he told reporters before opening the First International Symposium on Thirukurral at Universiti Malaya here.
He said there were 700 to 800 Malaysian Indian students studying at CSMU and other universities in Russia and he feared that the same thing might happen to the other universities because "these are the universities where people who don't get places in the country are studying."
MMC president Datuk Dr Mohamed Ismail Merican announced on Thursday that the council had withdrawn recognition of the medical undergraduate programme offered by CSMU to students registered and admitted into academic year one after Dec 31, 2005.
He said the MMC had also decided at its June 14 meeting not to recognise similar programmes offered by 10 other universities in Ukraine.
He said that after the authorities visited CSMU in October 2003 to verify CSMU as well as the other 10 Ukrainian universities, they found that some of the Malaysian students admitted into the medical undergraduate course were school drop-outs with very poor secondary school results.
He also said that the ability of the Ukrainian universities to provide teaching in English was doubtful as the number of English-speaking lecturers and the facilities were insufficient to meet the demand from the sudden increase in the number of Malaysian students.