Between the walls of universities is arising a diabolical dark world hinged to the academic and social life of some students ridden with all sorts of sexual immorality including the delicate and heart wrenching sex for grades.
This is a corrupt practice in which sex is exchanged for good grades as opposed to studying hard and smart as required by the education system.
According to YMCA Africa Alliance, “One can say there is a market where sex is exchanged for grades.
Many young female students have found themselves in this predicament, either as victims of abuse or as victimizers who carry bottom power on them.
In some instances, a transactional operation where both parties, the student and the lecturer consent to having sex in exchange for grades to pass a course happens.”
While education, which is considered to be the greatest key to success, calls for a huge sacrifice for anyone who intends to benefit from it, it has been observed that a number of students in institutions of higher learning focus less on studies and more on social activities making it difficult for them to pass their exams and continuous assessments. This is attributed to the fact that they limit their time for preparation and practice. These students then fail to get good grades and as such risk their lives and futures by offering themselves to lecturers in order to pass.
On September 14, 2013 Daily Monitor featured an article, ‘Lectures’ tale of students offering sex for marks’ in which they revealed the schemes and advancements of some of the students towards their lecturers.
A lecturer from the School of Computing and Infomation Technology at Makerere University revealed that “Way before the semester begins, female students find out what lecturer will be teaching which course unit. Once they have acquired this information, their weigh their options and make decisions accordingly.
They will know who is a no-nonsense lecturer that they will not bother with their crafty schemes. They will go for the one they suspect can easily succumb to their appetizing offers.” He also noted that these students often chose not to take the course units when they realized they had no way of getting to certain lecturers. According to this lecturer, the students are merely exhibiting a lazy and laissez faire attitude towards studies.
“They are trying to find the easy way out. They know that they will fail the exams and are therefore planning a way out in advance to escape retakes,” he said.
He also added that some students are caught in tight situations where they think that offering sex to lecturers is the only way they can pass; these are mostly working students, while others are driven by pressure from strict parents who want nothing less than them passing and eventually graduating.
On the other-hand, a number of cases have been reported of lecturers wanting or demanding sexual favors from their students and intentionally failing students who refuse to offer themselves up for sex. This leaves them at crossroads between submitting to a lecturer’s sexual advances or settling for a retake. Women’s eNews reported that “the practice of male lecturers at Makerere demanding sex from female students in exchange for diplomas and ‘carpet’ grades -indicating where the transaction takes place- is well known.”
The Parliament select committee investigating sexual violence in institutions and schools received four letters from students in kyambogo University accusing one of the lecturers at the faculty of Engineering for demanding for sex from female students in exchange for good marks. Prof Badru Ddungu Kateregga, the chairperson of the universities vice chancellors forum of Uganda, said at a Kampala University function, “We (Vice Chancellors) are aware that this vice is eating up most universities and we greatly condemn those involved; lately suspensions have effected on the perpetrators but we are now considering putting up more serious punishments to deter others.”
Sexual vices and other social vices continue to exist in both public and private universities in the country among which include drunkenness, prostitution, fornication and blackmail. 23 students of Islamic University in Uganda IUIU were in 2018 suspended for a year for reportedly indulging in sexually immoral activities while on campus. A number of female students have also resorted to prostitution while at campus to raise money for various things and for other reasons which only shows how rotten our moral fabric is.
A 23-year-old, then a third year university student speaking to a reporter from CampusBee said “Most of the time I just feel I need men. I can’t have several men on campus because I fear getting stigmatized and isolated by my friends that is why I come all the way from campus to this place to satisfy myself.”
The habit started after she had sex with and was left by her ex boyfriend in her second year leaving her with uncontrollable sex urges. The same website reported that platforms like exoticuganda.com aid the girls with this scheme on with profiles of the girls, online prostitution nude photos of them and their prices are listed.
