The Director-General of the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission (GTEC), Prof. Ahmed Jinapor Abdulai, has disclosed that many foreign institutions awarding doctorate degrees to Ghanaians are not accredited.

According to him, checks conducted by GTEC have revealed that the operations of several of these institutions are questionable, raising serious concerns about the validity of the certificates they issue.

“Some certificates that are claimed to have been obtained from some institutions are invalid because the basis upon which those certificates were given is questionable,” he said.

Prof. Ahmed Jinapor explained that the problem largely involves foreign institutions operating outside Ghana.

“In our case, we have come to realise that a number of these institutions happen not to be in Ghana. Most of these institutions happen to be foreign institutions; they don’t have accreditation,” he stated. “The operation is questionable, and in each of these, we do serious checks and even engage the individuals.”

GTEC has in recent times publicly named several individuals for using what it describes as fake academic titles, while also calling out some Ghanaian universities for operating without the required accreditation.

However, Prof. Ahmed Jinapor noted that the individuals publicly mentioned represent only a small fraction of those the Commission has engaged over questionable doctorate degrees.

“The number of persons who have been publicly called out only represents a microcosm of the number of people we have engaged,” he said.

He added that most individuals confronted by the Commission over fake or honorary doctorate degrees usually agree to stop using the titles once the issues are explained to them.

“To be honest with you, most of the people that we engage, when they understand and appreciate the dynamics of where they find themselves, they just say, ‘we are not interested,’” he said. “Some say they were given an honorary doctorate with the intention that they could use it, but if the regulator says they cannot use it and it dilutes the environment, they are ready to let it go.”

Prof. Ahmed Jinapor rejected claims that GTEC’s actions are driven by personal vendettas.

“I can say for a fact that 99% of all the individuals who have come into the public domain, we have had some form of engagement with them,” he said. “Private conversations, written letters, and in most instances, those who have agreed based on our conversation to shelve those degrees are more than those who have not.”

He said only a few individuals have refused to heed the Commission’s advice.

“It is only a few – I am hesitant to use the word ‘recalcitrant’ – who more or less refuse our advice. It is not an issue of personal vendetta. Most of these people, we don’t even know them,” he said in an interview with TV3.

Prof. Ahmed Jinapor added that public feedback suggests many Ghanaians support GTEC’s efforts to sanitise the country’s academic system.