Law student spends years fighting for UG results

Apr 23, 2017 News

…intended career quashed, as the University moves to CCJ

Clairmonte Cox became a student of the University of Guyana in 2000. In 2003, he sat the examinations, and was confident that his grades would place him right at the top of the local entrants to Hugh Wooding Law School in Trinidad

Clairmonte Cox, armed with his bundle of paper evidence.

and Tobago. He had every hope of returning home and eventually becoming a top notch attorney-at-law.
Unfortunately, his entire career was thrown out of the window. Cox ended up being embroiled in a series of legal battles with UG, for his 2003 results, which eventually came 10 years later. But even then, Cox’s worries have not ended.
“What happened was, I was not a paying student. I had applied for a loan, and the Ministry of Finance apparently had some hiccups in accurately getting the payment to UG, so when the university withheld my results, they said that it was because I had outstanding payments,” the Central High School teacher told Kaieteur News.
Having spent years exhausting every possible internal avenue, Cox wrote his final letter to the University in 2011, and received a response from the Registrar, Vincent Alexander, who claimed that the institution hadn’t any examination results for Cox, since he was not a student at the University.
Simultaneously, Cox received additional letters from UG officials, acknowledging that he was a student, but that he needed to settle all his outstanding balances before receiving his examination results.
What is strange however, is while Cox was denied his results in 2003 because of outstanding payments, records show that he had until 2006 to settle his arrears.
“I admit that I was lagging in payments, but I still had time to clear it off, so I never understood how they could’ve just refused to give me my results,” Cox said.
Eventually, the gentleman’s court action was completed, and the ruling was handed down in his favour. “The court ordered that UG give me my results,” he said.
It was only seven months after the ruling that Cox was provided with the results. He was not satisfied. The results, which, at one point, hadn’t existed, showed that he had failed in two subject areas.
This prompted Cox to legally request a review of the examination results.
“I wanted for me and my lawyers to be present,” the Central High School teacher said.
This, too, was approved by the court, causing UG’s legal representatives to request a stay order. This was thrown out, and UG was ordered to go ahead with the review.
But the institution, in response, appealed both the decision by the court to give Cox his results, and the latter decision to conduct a review.
According to Cox, the appeal too was quashed, and now, the University is looking to take its appeal to the Caribbean Court of Justice.
“Even with everything that I can prove, they’re still trying to fight it. I think they realise how much they have wronged me, and the trouble that they are in. They caused my entire career to go down the drain,” Cox lamented.
He said that UG is looking to take the same quashed appeal to the CCJ.
Repeated efforts by this newspaper, to contact Mr Alexander have proven futile.