Foreign students in limbo as course accreditation revoked
Around 800 foreign students in Malaysia are in limbo after the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA) revoked accreditation for eight courses at the private Limkokwing University of Creative Technology (LUCT), which also operates a number of branch campuses elsewhere in Asia and in Africa.
Foreign students at the private university in Selangor state near Kuala Lumpur said numerous bachelors, MBA and PhD courses at LUCT Malaysia have had accreditation revoked by the MQA after students had already commenced the course.
This appeared to be due to an “inability to maintain certain requirements and standards set by the relevant authorities”, Limkokwing students said at a press conference earlier this month.
Following months of political uncertainty, Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, with the consent of King Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah, declared a state of national emergency in the country. While ostensibly addressing the spread of Covid-19, the national emergency also reveals huge challenges to the current government, creating a litmus test for the prime minister to prove the continued legitimacy of his government.
Even as the palace has stated that the emergency is likely to continue till August, it has given undue executive powers to the prime minister and his cabinet to pass laws and ordinances bypassing the normative parliamentary legislative processes. The announcement was made almost immediately after a total nationwide implementation of travel restrictions across several states of the country on account of challenges from the increasing spread of the pandemic.