When Leaders Become an Umbrella for Academic Corruption
An open letter to the Prime Minister on the higher-education reform battle — and how some leaders have flipped from guardians of reform to protectors of corruption.
It is easy for some leaders to wave the banner of “reform,” to speak the language of quality, governance, and integrity. What is far harder is for those slogans to become real decisions that confront corruption rather than coexist with it. In higher-education institutions, the most dangerous form of corruption is not the kind practiced in the shadows — it is the kind that wears the cloak of reform, hides behind grand administrative jargon, ceremonial committees, and polished rhetoric.
Since 2024, genuine signs of hope appeared in one of our higher-education institutions through a report submitted by the secretary of the Kuwaiti Society for Quality Education to the Office of the Prime Minister, and through the recommendations of the ministerial investigation committee that followed. The committee uncovered the scale of mischief that had infected the academic-promotions file, and the related infractions that struck at the heart of scientific research and the institution’s reputation. Updating the promotions bylaw was, at that point, a required and overdue step — especially with the establishment of an institutional technical committee to vet scientific journals, intended to stop the bleeding of promotions built on flimsy publication or journals that fail the most basic standards of serious scholarship.
From the moment that committee was formed, criticism poured in. Its composition was questioned, its competence challenged, and the attacks descended to personal targeting of its members. But away from the noise, that committee represented the first serious attempt to build an “academic filter” — one that would protect the institution from the scholarly contamination that had accumulated for years under the cover of favors, relationships, and interests.
The truth some refuse to admit is that the higher-education reform battle is not only a battle of bylaws — it is a battle of will. How many excellent bylaws have been hollowed out the moment they collided with leaders who believe in reform only when it serves their influence and centers of power.
Today, two years on, the Kuwaiti Society for Quality Education continues to document major violations and serious infractions in the promotions file at this institution. What is more dangerous than the existence of attempts to push through suspect promotions or low-grade journals is the existence of administrative and leadership support for those attempts — as if some leaders have decided to convert themselves from guardians of reform into an umbrella that shelters academic corruption.
What is unfolding now reveals clearly that some leaders have yet to grasp that real reform cannot coexist with a mindset of evasion and circumvention. Instead of supporting the promotions committee and the journals-accreditation committee, pressure is exerted on them through side channels and grievance committees — sometimes used as tools to bypass technical decisions, and to circumvent the committee specialized in accrediting scientific journals, all to obtain approvals that push through promotions which cannot withstand any respectable academic evaluation.
More dangerous still: the institution continues to review promotions submitted under the old bylaw, which expired in mid-2024 — as if administrative time has stopped at a specific moment that serves specific interests. This is not a mere procedural flaw; it is a serious indicator of the absence of seriousness in implementing the academic-reform project. Reform does not consist of issuing bylaws and then disabling them in practice the moment they touch those who hold power.
What is being circulated about the routing of correspondence and directives through employees who hold neither the legal standing nor the competence to address the technical committees raises serious questions about the nature of management inside the institution: Are we facing a modern university administration that believes in institutionalism? Or a network of relationships attempting to reproduce the old system with new faces and shiny slogans?
What is painful is that some leaders have come to treat the reform committees as a burden to be contained or intimidated — not as partners to be supported. Every time a technical committee comes close to laying its hand on the source of a problem, the maneuvering, the pressure, and the doubt-casting begin. As if these committees were required to be mere institutional décor, providing a reformist image to the public while not actually performing their real role.
Your Highness, the Prime Minister: today’s matter is no longer a matter of individual promotions or scientific journals alone. It has become a matter of trust in the entire reform project. When an honest academic feels that the corrupt still find protection, and that the technical committees are fought rather than supported, the message reaching the academic community is dangerous and destructive.
Reform is not measured by the number of statements nor by the number of committees, but by the state’s capacity to confront centers of power inside its own institutions. And if some leaders continue to patronize academic corruption, or tolerate it, or attempt to polish it under the cover of “procedures” and “grievances,” then their continued presence in their positions means, simply, that the reform project is corroding from within.
The bottom line, Your Highness: how long will the patting on the shoulders of leaders who patronize corruption rather than confront it continue? How long will the technical committees be left to fight alone, besieged by pressure and administrative intimidation? If the Minister lacks the genuine will to strike academic corruption with an iron hand, then it would be more fitting to make way for one who has the courage to protect what remains of higher education’s dignity and reputation.