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389 invalid transcripts, 242 responded, 162 Doctor of Medicine degrees revoked: the unapproved grading system at a Tanzanian constituent college and the Senate decision of 2023
Medical education in Tanzania sits under two layers of authority. The Tanzania Commission for Universities (TCU) regulates institutions and their academic rules, while each university's Senate awards degrees and, under the Universities Act No. 7 of 2005, can revoke them. In 2023 that second layer failed a cohort of medical graduates who were not accused of any wrongdoing themselves.
According to The Citizen, St Augustine University of Tanzania (SAUT) revoked the Doctor of Medicine degrees of 162 graduates of its constituent college, the St Francis University College of Health and Allied Sciences (SFUCHAS), who had graduated between 2015 and 2019 and had not complied with a recall of their transcripts that began in 2021. SAUT spokesperson Living Komu told the paper that before 2017 a C pass had needed 50 marks under the university's own grading system, where the government system required 40, and that SFUCHAS had erred in grading its 2015 to 2017 graduates; TCU directed the college to recall and rectify the transcripts. The Senate decided the revocation at its 54th Extraordinary Meeting on 25 February 2023. TCU executive secretary Prof Charles Kihampa said the commission could not interfere, because the Senate has the mandate to revoke certificates.
Daily News reported a press conference in Mwanza on 29 March 2023 at which the Vice Chancellor and Senate chairman, Prof Costa Mahalu, said 389 SFUCHAS medical graduates had received transcripts the Senate did not recognise, and only 242 had responded to the request to exchange them. He said the college's administrators had designed a new grading system and republished transcripts without Senate approval, reportedly to boost graduates' performance, and that the principal and deputy principal were demoted after admitting it. The revocation was made under Section 47(1) and (2) of the Act; the cancelled degrees remain pending until the required certificates are submitted.
On the university's own account, a constituent college applied a grading scale its parent Senate had not approved, then reissued transcripts on its own authority. Neither report suggests the graduates forged anything. A genuine transcript from a genuine college can still be declared invalid when the approval chain was skipped, and the graduate carries the consequence.
The lesson for a student weighing a medical degree abroad is to ask who signs off on the transcript. Where a college belongs to a larger university, confirm with the regulator, in Tanzania the TCU, that the Senate approves its grading system and certificates. If a university later asks you to exchange a document, respond; the alternative here was a revoked degree. Tanzania's other case on this site, the Muhimbili impostor, is about a fake doctor; this one shows that even honest graduates must understand the paperwork behind their qualification.
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This is a news-sourced case summary written by the TrustMBBS team, not a first-person account; see the sources above. They reflect one person's experience and are not a verdict on any institution. Report your own: Report a scam or tell your story.