The Nigerian Students Association at SIU has appealed to the Federal Government for intervention, emphasizing the urgency as the exam deadline approaches.
The Federal Ministry of Education and NUC have advised the students to formally petition the education minister for assistance. However, efforts to get responses from the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM) and UDUTH were unsuccessful.
The students remain in limbo as they await a resolution that could determine their future in the medical profession.
The students, who fled Sudan as a result of conflict, were unable to retrieve their passports, which contained the required entry and exit visas.
Their inability to provide these documents has jeopardized their chances of sitting for the June 2025 MDCN exams, putting their medical careers at risk.
The students, who were in their final year at Sudan International University (SIU), were permitted by the National Universities Commission (NUC) to complete their studies at Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital (UDUTH) in Sokoto under a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
They graduated in 2024 with SIU-awarded certificates but now face MDCN registration challenges due to missing travel documents.
The MDCN mandates that foreign-trained medical graduates submit their first-entry and last-exit visas as part of the exam registration process, since the students were evacuated without their passports, they lack these crucial documents.
MDCN Registrar Dr. Fatima Kyari acknowledged the challenges faced by students from conflict zones like Sudan but clarified that the MoU with UDUTH was an academic collaboration, not a clinical training pathway recognized by the council.
She noted that students who properly transferred to accredited Nigerian universities were exempt from foreign-trained graduate exams. However, the affected students argue that their case should be reconsidered given the exceptional circumstances.
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