Goolam Mohamedbhai

China has understood what many countries still fail to appreciate: higher education is a key vehicle not only to achieve economic development but also to attain ‘soft power’ regionally and globally.

Any observer of higher education in Africa would immediately realize that African universities, with the exception of a handful, stand no chance of appearing under the THE Rankings; or for that matter under other global university rankings that use criteria with a heavy bias on research, publications in international refereed journals and citations.  African universities have to cope with huge student enrolment with limited financial and physical resources. They are short of academic staff, a large proportion of whom do not have a PhD.  Not surprisingly, their research output and performance in postgraduate education are poor.  It is clear that in the rankings race, they are playing on a non-level field. 

Is reservation fair? Yes! say the pro-reservationists, as that is the only way to redress social inequity. No!, say the anti-reservationists, as it goes against meritocracy since well-qualified candidates are debarred at the expense of less-qualified ones. But, retort the pro-reservationists, it is precisely because lower caste candidates have not had the opportunity to attend the best schools that they need to have reserved seats

Ethiopia, with a population of 75 million, is one of the poorest countries on earth, having 98% of its population earning less than US$ 2 per day. Since nearly a decade the country has produced several planning documents to guide its development, to alleviate poverty and to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. The more recent strategy documents have clearly identified higher education as one of the key instruments for achieving the country’s goals.