Sex for grades: Foreign students most vulnerable - Lecturer

A journalism and communications lecturer at AUCC in Accra has disclosed that international students tend to be more susceptible to the ‘sex for grades’ predicament in the country’s tertiary institutions.

Samuel Ato Afful, who admitted to being the favourite of many students at the African University College of Communication explained that students who travel from other countries to school in Ghana were more liable because they have more to lose.

Although he would not explicitly admit the prevalence of the phenomenon in his institution, he asserted that since the international students were paying more fees and had to prove to their parents their funds were not being wasted, they resorted to all sorts of means.

“...I think international students are sometimes most vulnerable. Generally speaking, they have left their country and come to another country; they’re spending more because they are paying more fees than the Ghanaian students. Their parents must have a reason to keep them here; they’re paying hostel fees, etc it’s expensive. So if they don’t make the grades, their parents may recall them back home.

They have freedom in Ghana, nobody controls them. So they will want to learn hard and make it. They sometimes make the wrong friends because they want to pass…” the lecturer explained.

Mr Ato Afful’s comment comes at the back of an undercover investigative piece carried out by BBC Africa eye to expose lecturers who take advantage of students in exchange for grades.

The report which covered two premier universities in Ghana and Nigeria implicated senior lecturers who have since been interdicted by authorities of the respective schools.

Prof Ransford Gyampo and Dr Butakor of the University of Ghana have both agreed to step aside for investigations to be carried out.