Former nursing and midwifery technician students from Christian Health Association of Malawi (Cham) colleges, who failed Nurses and Midwives Council of Malawi licensure examinations in October 2016, have asked President Peter Mutharika to intervene on the issue of results of their examinations.
The students Thursday marched to Lilongwe District Council offices to present their grievances through a petition addressed to the Office of the President and Cabinet (OPC).
The recently released council’s results indicated that out of the 669 students, 501 failed the examination, representing a 75 percent failure rate.
The four-page petition accuses the council for rebuffing their request to re-mark and standardise the results, as they believe that the council deliberately made them fail.
The group’s leader, Victor Makombola said they would like Mutharika to assist them to get their licences as soon as possible and also clear the rumours that government and the council have connived to reduce the number of nurses and technicians to be recruited.
“We are saying if government is honest enough and is not involved in this, the President will help us. The council acknowledges that the examinations were full of errors. We believe, as students, in a normal setting, the number of those who failed is too many,” Makombola said
The petition is further asking the elimination of the policy of having fixed three attempts for the students to be given licences arguing it is violating their right to practice.
“They did not give us proper rationale for the policy and the ill-treatment we are experiencing that is deliberately causing us to fail, we strongly believe that the policy has to be revised,” reads part of the statement.
Principal Administration Officer for Lilongwe District Council, Marriette Kadewere, acknowledged receipt of the petition and said it will be taken to the relevant authorities
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