-Following receipt of Honorary Doctorate from his ‘Alma’
PRESIDENT Bharrat Jagdeo can now rightly be called Dr Bharrat Jagdeo following the conferral yesterday of an Honorary Doctorate on him by his Alma mater, the former Patrice Lumumba University now the Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia, before an audience of 6,000 invited guests.
The president attended the university some 20 years ago, and obtained his Masters Degree in Economics at the end of his studies there, which means he had to be conversant in Russian to have been able to do that. He was selected by the university’s Academic Board on January 25, 2010 for the award.
The conferral ceremony was held at The Kremlin on the 50th Anniversary celebration of the founding of the University, which was established by the former USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) Government on February 5, 1960.
President Jagdeo, on receiving the honour, delivered a speech in Russian to the packed auditorium, his first such address since leaving the university.
In his presentation, he thanked the University for according him the honour and commended the institution for its multiculturalism.
On February 22, 1961, the university was renamed in honour of Patrice Lumumba, the leader of what later became the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who had been overthrown and murdered in a coup.
In the first year, 539 foreign students from 59 countries were enrolled, in addition to 57 Soviet students.
The university has, since its founding, graduated 90,000 students who work in approximately 165 different countries around the world. It has 57 programmes with a student population of about 33,000 students (including post-graduates and trainees) of 450 nationalities. (GINA)