A rejoinder to my reaction to Prof. Mamdani's "Makerere: Time for a rethink"

By Mukwanason A. Hyuha

I recently published an article in the New Vision responding to Prof Mamdani's on Makerere University.

However, there are other important issues, raised by my good friend (Mamdani), that I had not included in my reactions, although they are as important as those I discussed.

These issues are the major subject of this rejoinder; they include the view that the number of students should be reduced, Makerere should be "transformed from a mainly undergraduate to a mainly graduate university" within a short time, "from a mainly instructional to a mainly research university," and so on.

I also include in this rejoinder short comments on articles by Prof. Abdu B. Kasozi, Mr. Henry Mayega and Dr. Ian Clarke that appeared in the New Vision and the Sunday Vision a few days ago.

Further, I read Prof. Abdu B. Kasozi's article (External forces, funding of universities) in the November 28, 2016 paper. Prof. Kasozi alleges that I disagree "with Mamdani's assertion that external financial forces, particularly led by the World Bank, adversely impacted on Makerere's funding and share part of the blame for the predicament of what Makerere is in today." No, in my paper, I never agreed or disagreed that external forces had an impact on Makerere's funding problems. I never discussed this issue! What I disagree with are, among others,

That government contribution to Makerere's budget was 100% in academic year 1993/1994, as Mamdani writes—allegedly quoting Prof. Abdu B. Kasozi's work at MISR. The 100% statistic is definitely wrong, given the available evidence.

That the coming to board of the private students-sponsorship scheme in Makerere was the initiative of the World Bank. This was because the "{World} Bank called for an increased intake of fee-paying students in all faculties."

I disagree because the scheme is the brain child of the administrators and academicians at that time, with the full support of President Museveni and his government who gave us the permission to proceed with the scheme

That fees were determined so as to get as much income as possible—an implication of Mamdani's assertion that fees determination was based on a cost-benefit analysis.

He describes a system where total costs are divided by the number of students to come up with the price (fees) payable by each student on a given programme. As explained in the paper, this was not the fees determination mechanism used at Makerere.

That Makerere can be transformed into a mainly graduate university in three years—an idea that is based on too much stretching of one's fertile imaginations that it borders on utter utopianism! This issue is discussed in detail later in this rejoinder.

And so on. As an economist, I know that government gets its revenues from taxation, non-tax sources, earnings from its properties and investments, and donors.

Donor funds include those from development partners, other countries, the World Bank and other organisations. Any decrease in funds from any of these sources or a combination of them will result in a decrease in government revenues. Yes, per capita increases of financial flows to Makerere had declined noticeably by 1993. This is what I stated, backing myself with statistics.

As a trained statistician and professional econometrician, without a proper, detailed analysis of the data, I cannot, with confidence, state "that external financial forces, particularly led by the World Bank, adversely impacted on Makerere's funding". Was it the external funding, and not the other sources, that led to decreases in government financial flows to Makerere?

What we know for sure is that government net tax revenue was very low at that time:  Shs 180.46 billion, 282.6 billion, 373.35 billion, and 506.99 billion in fiscal years 1991/92, 1992/93, 1993/94, 1994/95, respectively. It has since had an upward trend, reaching Shs 9,713.81 billion and 11,230.87 billion in 2014/15 and 2015.2016, respectively.

Other than low tax collections at that time, government had other sectors to spend on, in addition to education. As a result, all other sectors were also allocated insufficient funds—of course, some more than others. Was this because of the World Bank, or due to the general shortage of funds?

Prof. Kasozi goes through various historical issues—leaving out the World Development Report of 1993—and quotes various reports I was already aware of to show by connotation, association, and casual empiricism or anecdotal evidence (not by econometric or cliometric analysis) that there was a relationship between World Bank financial flows to Uganda and Makerere's funding.

Yes, external funding is likely to have influenced the resources available to the Ugandan government for financing various activities. But does this mean that it influenced directly the fee-paying scheme in Makerere? Is there credible evidence that it was the World Bank, rather than the Uganda Government, that was deciding financial allocations to each sector or subsector?

As a friend of mine put it to me, "Sometimes people want to match reality to their theory of what is going on." Such people would like to force real world data to bear out their theories, even when the data are unwilling to do so, or ‘speak in a naïve language' (to use Ragnar Frisch's terminology).

Any good analyst, interested in assessing the impact of the fee-paying scheme should carry out a "before and after" study—by comparing the situations at the university up to the time the scheme was introduced (the ‘before' period) and the period thereafter, up to the current time (the ‘after' period). The university has made tremendous progress since the introduction of the fee-paying scheme, as Dr. Clarke, among others, observes.

This is a summary response to Kasozi's article. A detailed response is under preparation. But I hope my points are clear.

Student intake and numbers following introduction of the fee-paying scheme

As categorically stated in my initial reactions, the private student sponsorship scheme was mooted, initiated and launched basically because Makerere University was at that time experiencing very severe financial constraints that needed urgent attention to prevent the institution from deteriorating further at an exponential speed, if not ultimate collapse.

From the outset, there were two factors to look at in greater detail, among others. These were, first, the number of students vis-à-vis available facilities—facilities such as lecture halls, books, journals and other requirements, office space for instructors, recreation amenities, accommodation and boarding space especially for students, and so on—and, second, funds and other resources to cater for the increased number of students on a sustainable basis.

The ideal situation would have been to expand facilities before admitting more and more students—a situation that would have led to an ideal research, learning and study environment for all participants.

This was ideal but utopian, for there was no way one could rehabilitate and expand facilities on a sustainable basis without the funds. One had to get funds first before thinking of rehabilitating, improving and expanding facilities. Hence, for some time, the university admitted more and more students, knowing fully well that facilities would be extremely strained due to large numbers. Lecture rooms and theatres were overcrowded initially.

However, as more and more funds were obtained through tuition and user fees, the university developed the capacity to improve facilities. For example, some of the internally generated funds were used to rehabilitate old buildings (including the Main Building), and to put up new buildings—such as the Academic Registrar's Building (now known as Senate House, constructed using just accruals from application and other user fees), a building at the Faculty of Law, one at the Faculty of Social Sciences, one at the School of Education, et cetera.

The rehabilitated and new buildings were each built by the concerned income-generating unit from its internally generated funds. The buildings substantially increased lecture space, office space and space for other academic activities.

For example, the Academic Registrar's Building has a number of lecture rooms, two big halls each able to sit 200 participants in a conference, a  relatively smaller room for meetings, office space for all the Academic Registrar's staff, extra office space originally meant for renting out so as to generate more income, a modern banking hall being rented to Stanbic Bank, a cafeteria, and various storage spaces.

The question of the ‘chicken and egg' puzzle did not arise; we knew funds had to come first. This situation caused short-term pain, but long-term satisfaction and enjoyment. That is, in the short run, the students had to undergo various difficulties or inconveniences—such as overcrowding in lecture rooms, inadequate books and other study facilities, inadequate personal attention from instructors, and so on.

For some classes, the lecture rooms or halls were so overcrowded that students used to joke that they were studying "by remote control or by osmosis"; but they did not go on strike because we had comprehensively explained to them this ‘chicken and egg' situation, and they had appreciated the situation. To stress, it would have been pure utopianism or utter wishful thinking to have expected the university to expand facilities before admitting more and more students. As the saying goes, "If wishes were horses, all beggars would ride".

The problem at Makerere and other public universities in Uganda is not the large student populations. It is the sheer lack of financial resources to cater for the increased numbers.

Universities in North America (including Harvard University and Columbia University) have very large student populations, but do not experience student or teacher strikes because funds from tuition and user fees, endowments, donors, shareholders, returns from their investments, earnings from their professors' and lecturers' research projects, Chairs at various units, partnerships with industry, inter-institutional collaborations, and other financial accruals are far in excess of their total expenditures.

The problem with Makerere and other public universities in the Republic is that they have limited sources of revenue. In the two papers I published on Makerere in a local newspaper in March 2008, I did urge Makerere to explore some of these funding alternatives. Hence, to recommend that Makerere reduces the student population is to urge the university to tackle symptoms, rather than the main disease (inadequate funding) gnawing at the institution's bones.

After all, a significant reduction in student admissions will lead to a sizeable reduction in internally generated funds, in the face of ever dwindling financial flows from government (on a per capita basis) and a stagnant fees structure. Note that this is already happening.

Finally, on this issue of large student numbers, with good foresight and planning, everybody expected the facilities to expand in pace with increases in student numbers in the medium and long runs. When I and colleagues in the Academic Registrar's department constructed the Academic Registrar's Building (Senate House) at an approximate cost of Shs. 4 billion, the total student population (that paid registration and other user fees) was just over 15,000. Further, ‘A' level applicants (that paid application fees) were around 30,000, application fee was Shs 8,000, registration fee was also low; so were other user fees in general.

My department was able to use internally generated funds from only these user fees to put up and almost completely furnish the said building. The university student population has since risen to about 40,000, ‘A' level applicants are now over 100,000, and many user fees are far much higher than they were in the 1990s. Hence, one expects substantial increases in revenues from user fees.

There is no other building built from purely internally generated funds like the Senate House. (Note that the gender and women department and the computer science buildings, along with many other new buildings on campus, have been put up with considerable donor funding.) How have the substantially increased earnings, particularly from user fees, been used? Is it a planning problem?

Are there inefficiencies and deficiencies in the collection and deployment of tuition and user fees? Is some embezzlement of the funds taking place? Why don't facilities grow in tandem with student numbers? These are questions that need urgent answers in the process of rejuvenating Makerere, at least from the financing viewpoint.

Transforming Makerere into a mainly graduate university

Prof. Mamdani proposes that Makerere should be "transformed from a mainly undergraduate to a mainly graduate university" and, hence, "from a mainly instructional to a mainly research university". He proposes that this should be done in three years by phasing out undergraduate programmes as graduate programmes are phased in. In so doing, the university should eventually be dominated by graduate (postgraduate) students, with a few undergraduate students.

Graduate training is an area I have considerable expertise and experience in. Over the years since 1980, I have participated in various graduate programmes in Africa as a designer, initiator, implementer, supervisor of graduate students and instructor, in addition to serving as an external examiner at many universities in Africa. These graduate programmes include the following:

•    The Master's Degree Programmes in Economics at the Universities of Botswana and Swaziland:  I actively participated in the designing of these programmes in the 1980s.

•    The Master's Degree Programme in Economics at the University of Dar es Salaam:  I participated in programme management, teaching of courses and student thesis supervision on this programme (including revamping the Econometrics course outline) from 1980 to 1990.

•    The Master of Arts Degree Programme in Economic Policy and Planning, M.A. (EPP). This is a programme that was launched around 1992 at the then Department of Economics, Makerere University, with funds initially from Lome III, thanks to President Yoweri Museveni. Under the programme, many middle-level economists in government were trained at the Master's degree level so as to cover deficiencies they had from their undergraduate training and to provide them with vast analytical skills in economics hinged on ‘best practices'. A team from Makerere was invited to join the late Dr. Suleiman Kiggundu and myself (then at the Ministry of Planning and Economic Development) and the late Prof. Ian Livingstone to come up with the nitty-gritty of the programme, which we successfully did. Thereafter, Dr. Kiggundu managed the programme and I was one of its instructors from its launching until 2000. The programme is no longer donor-funded.

•    The Collaborative PhD Degree Programme in Economics (CPP) for Sub-Saharan Africa. This is a programme that was launched in 2002 under the auspices of the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), headquartered in Nairobi. The AERC also runs a collaborative Master's degree programme in economics (CMAP) for Anglophone Africa. I was an instructor on the CMAP for 6 years (1993-1998), and also participated in its design. Regarding the CPP, as a resident consultant and later its manager, I was the focal person at the AERC from 2001 to 2010. in addition to teaching research methodology to CPP students. Note that many of the lecturers in the School of Economics—including the current College of Business and Economic Sciences principal—are products of CPP, admitted under my management.

Before transforming Makerere University into a graduate university, one should look at the requirements for such a radical move. One needs to look at a few variables. For example, one needs to find lasting solutions to various problems, including, inter alia, the following (that, currently characterise Makerere University):

•    Inadequate academic staff:  There are many unfilled vacancies at the university. In fact, only around 45% of the establishment across the board is filled. This makes it difficult even to cater satisfactorily for the existing undergraduate programmes

•    Inadequate number of senior academic staff:  Like all other universities in Uganda, Makerere University is ‘bottom-heavy' in terms of academic staff; there is an acute shortage of staff from the rank of senior lecturer to that of full professor. Other than for teaching and outreach activities, one needs a good number of senior staff to supervise students, carry out research and mentor young academicians. Makerere does not have the required numbers.

•    A low remuneration package for academic staff:  The remuneration package in Makerere is much lower than the packages for staff with similar academic qualifications, duties and experience engaged by many organisations in the government and the private sector in Uganda. One only needs to look at packages for URA, KCCA, Parliament, and NSSF to appreciate this point. From my numerous visits to many universities in Africa during my stay with the AERC (2001-2010), I noted, among other things, that the Makerere remuneration package is also far lower than those of academic staff at the Universities of Nairobi, Botswana, Cape Town and other universities in South Africa, Ibadan (and other universities in Nigeria), Yaounde II, Cocody-Abidjan, Cheikh Ante-Diop in Senegal, Swaziland, and many other universities in Sub-Saharan Africa. No wonder many Ugandan academicians have run to various countries in the sub-region for greener pastures. Will the transformed Makerere offer a better or comparable remuneration package to stem the brain drain and even persuade those outside the country to run back so as to boost staffing for graduate programmes? What skills, dexterity or miracles will be employed to attain such a feat?

•    Strategy for funding graduate student needs:  It is generally far cheaper to train an undergraduate student than a postgraduate student. So, if Makerere is turned into a graduate university, somebody must be willing and able to pick up student expenses across all programmes. Is government going to do this when it had already moved out of most graduate training? Are there donors to pick up the bills on a sustainable basis, without ‘donor fatigue'? Are parents and guardians to foot the bills, yet they are finding difficulties meeting cheaper undergraduate degree bills? Or, does one expect ‘manna from heaven' to help solve this funding issue? What viable strategy does one have to fund the new university sustainably?

•    Inadequate facilities for graduate training:  Other than well remunerated instructors to sustain the graduate programmes, one needs various facilities—such as the required books and journals, e-libraries, enough computers to cater for students and instructors, teaching by video conferencing and other ICT gadgets and related facilities, decent accommodation for students as is done on the ongoing MISR PhD degree programme, ‘boom' for students, and so on—so as to run and sustain a good graduate university. Again, who will fund these facilities and requirements on a sustainable basis for the ‘new Makerere University' Mamdani has in mind? Can even the ongoing MISR PhD programme be sustained without donor funding?

My reliable experience in this area tells me that one needs immense resources to fund any postgraduate programme. The MISR programme is, I believe, fully funded by donors, so are the CMAP and CPP programmes run on a continental basis by the AERC. Moreover, there are fields than can attract donor funding compared to others, yet a university in a developing country cannot afford to run graduate programmes in some fields (like science-related fields, commerce, business and management, etc.) and neglect others (like history, anthropology, archeology, literature and other such fields). Who would cater for these? Note that, as detailed in another paper I prepared in May this year, the other 40 degree-awarding institutions in Uganda are generally in a worse position than Makerere.

Hence, in view of the foregoing issues, Makerere is not ready to metamorphose into a major graduate university within three years. In fact, I strongly believe that this will not be possible even in the next twenty years or so. We are in Uganda, not on Mars or another terrestrial body. Let's be realistic, rather than utopian. If wishes were horses, beggars would indeed ride—particularly Ugandan beggars for that matter!

Politics, sectarianism and maladministration as causes of strikes in Makerere

There also exist groups of people that have argued that finance may not be the main cause of the wrangles and strikes at Makerere University. These groups do attribute the causes of the dissentions to one or a combination of the following variables:  politics, tribalism, other forms of sectarianism (such as religious and regional differences), and bad administration or management of the institution. I highlight these factors here, although I believe that they are not the major causes of the problems in Makerere. The factors have existed at Makerere—albeit with differing and changing intensities over time—since the country attained political independence in 1962. Note that, the factors also exist, although to a lesser degree, at the University of Nairobi, the University of Dar es Salaam, the University of Ibadan, and at other universities in the entire Sub-Saharan Africa and beyond, as far as I know. But, unlike Makerere University, these other universities are currently not characterised by similar upheavals. Moreover, despite the existence of the factors at Makerere since time immemorial, the institution did not experience these problems until the 1990s.

To begin with, Makerere University is not an island in Uganda; it is a microcosm of Uganda. Political differences and dissention, tribalism, discrimination on the basis of religious differences (especially apparently against Muslims), some degree of discrimination based on region of origin, and other diversities still rear their ugly heads in Uganda. So, it would be unreasonable and unwise to assume that Makerere University which consists of all types of people from various parts of Uganda is immune from these attributes or factors. It is not.

These factors flourish in Makerere as much as they do elsewhere in Uganda. For instance, whereas selections of the vice chancellor, deputy vice chancellors and a few other senior university officials are usually marred with sectarian tendencies, it is common knowledge that guild elections reflect a lot of the political sheds in Uganda. This is true not only since 1987; no, it has always been the case at least since 1970 when Makerere became a full-fledged national university. For example, during my student life at the university, guild presidential elections that brought Ekwaro, Tumusiime-Mutebile and Olara Otunnu to guild presidency were organised on the basis of Uganda's existing political parties. The UPC and other political parties had active branches on campus. Further, apart from the existence of a mosque and churches belonging to the main religions in the country, there were various regional and tribal associations, many of which were recognised by the students' guild and the university. Despite these diversities, there was peace and tranquility on campus, for the students and other people of various diversities had learned to co-exist, pursuing mutually acceptable and beneficial objectives.

As explained in my reactions to Mamdani's article, the major problem is inadequate finances, not politics, as Henry Mayega and others appear to believe. The university relies heavily on fees and grants-in-aid, since financial accruals from investments, endowments, research by lecturers and professors and other university activities are meagre. Hence, tuition and user fees are the main contributors to the internally generated funds at the university. There is, therefore, urgent need to expand and diversify the university's sources of revenue.

I strongly believe it is this inadequacy of financial resources that ‘provides the dry grass and the match box to light up the fire' (the wrangles, strikes and other hustles), so to speak. To continue with the imagery, the other factors—politics, sectarianism, and other diversities—just provide the extra fuel to enable the fire to burn at a higher intensity and to create side fires. Therefore, one expects politics and other factors to enter the picture immediately the fire is lit, or to hasten the lighting of the fire. When I was at Makerere, the "Nkoba za Mbogo" (an association of Baganda students) did organise demonstrations on campus and the surrounding areas immediately information was received that Kabaka Mutesa II had passed away while still in exile in London. This was a local, not global, demonstration since only members of the association participated—that is, the rest of the students were calm—unlike if the problem had had something to do with student feeding or allowances. It should be remembered that politicians are fond of capitalising on various unfortunate incidents and events and making mileage out of them.

Those who believe that it is politics and these other factors that are the major cause of strikes at Makerere are hereby offered my challenge. Let the university and its sole shareholder comprehensively and sustainably solve the financial inadequacy issue first and then we see whether or not wrangles, strikes and other hustles will continue, or be sustained in the short, medium and long runs. If I were of the betting type, I would challenge them by offering a good bet; but I am not, given my religion, upbringing and principles.

The writer is a Professor of Economics and former Academic Registrar of Makerere University
© Mukwanason A. Hyuha
hyuhama@gmail.com