Badmus Ololade Rafiate, 24, a Nigerian medical student in her last year at Ternopil State Medical University, died of poisoning on Jan. 16. While the police are still investigating the death, they suspect it was a suicide.
The tragedy has raised concerns about the possible mistreatment of foreign students in Ukrainian universities, as Rafiate’s friends say that the young woman was distraught because she was about to be expelled from the university.
A day before she died, Rafiate failed a pediatrics exam. She reportedly performed well on the test, but was not given a passing grade due to previously failing a mock exam taken in preparation for the final bachelor of medicine and surgery exam. Failing the exam meant expulsion.
According to the reports, Rafiate tried to transfer to a different medical university in order to take the same exam, but the Ternopil university allegedly refused to provide the transcript she needed in order to transfer. Instead, she was reportedly told to “return to Nigeria,” apply for another student visa and restart her six-year medical degree.
Her death has again sparked allegations that Ukrainian universities take on foreign students to make money, but don’t provide them adequate education and social support.
There are 63,800 foreign students studying in Ukrainian universities in the 2019-2020 academic year, including more than 3,500 from Nigeria. Most of the foreign students study in medical schools.
The university has denied any mistreatment. A statement by the university’s press service said that Rafiate was one of six students who failed the exam that day. They said it was their third attempt to pass the exam, the last try allowed.
According to the police, Rafiate’s family doesn’t believe her death was a suicide. The police are looking into several versions, including inducement to suicide, but say that murder is unlikely.
“We understand that the family is grieving and they have doubts,” Oleksandr Bohomol, chief of the police in Ternopil Oblast, said at a press conference on Jan. 20. “But so far we have no grounds to believe it was a murder.”
University criticized
In the wake of Rafiate’s suicide, university officials have faced criticism for mishandling the situation — both before and after her death.
Dr. Peter Akwasi Sarpong, leader of the National Board of the European Medical Students Association, or EMSA, says that poor treatment of international students is a “common thing in Ukraine.”
Ukrainian universities, and particularly medical schools, attract foreign students with low tuition prices and relatively high-quality education. The number of international students in Ukraine is growing every year.
But these foreign students can be expelled for “any irrational reason,” Sarpong told the Kyiv Post. The fact that Rafiate was allegedly only given the option to restart her medical degree is “a very common occurrence.”
Sarpong says that the problem in Ukraine is unusually stark and that, in other countries, issues of “injustice and corruption in the education system (are) not at the same level.”
Other members of the association who study in other European countries were “astonished at the story,” Sarpong added.
Friends and classmates of Rafiate specifically blame the dean of international students, Professor Petro Selskyy, for mishandling the situation.
When he posted a photo of Rafiate on Facebook with the caption “my deep condolences to family and friends of our dear Badmus,” he was met with a wave of criticism online. Some even called him “outrightly wicked and evil” and suggested he did not care “about the fate of students, only about the money.”
Selskyy has responded on Facebook that “false information is being shared on social media” and called on the public to “not believe in lies.”
The Kyiv Post reached Selskyy, who said he does not “have the ability to comment” and will provide information “if the opportunity arises.”
In response to the problems faced by international students, the EMSA is “trying to enforce certain regulations in a non-violent way,” such as by making sure that “universities have a clinical psychologist specifically for foreign students studying medicine in Ukraine,” Sarpong said.
Foreign students studying in Ukraine only want “humane treatment,” he added.
On Jan. 20, students organized a protest against mistreatment at the Ternopil medical school. In particular, they called for Selskyy’s resignation, saying he shows “no regard towards foreign students,” the Nigerian Students Union wrote on Instagram.
In response, Selskyy was suspended as dean of international students. Additionally, the university has made plans to hire a professional psychologist for foreign students, the student union later wrote.
Nigerian Austine Enekwechi, a former student of the Ternopil State Medical University who briefly knew Rafiate, told the Kyiv Post that he is “not surprised that she was so depressed.”
Enekwechi says he did not “have any personal issues with the dean,” but “did have issues with the administration.”
“It’s a money-making scheme that often expels students for trivial or frivolous reasons,” he said of the university.
Systemic problem?
Not everyone believes the problem was specific to the Ternopil university or Selskyy. Many see Rafiate’s death as the result of systemic problems in Ukrainian universities.
It was not the first time that a foreign student committed suicide at a Ukrainian university after alleged poor treatment by faculty.
Two years ago, first-year Turkmen student Mukaddas Nasyrlayeva, who studied dentistry at Bogomolets National Medical University in Kyiv, went missing on Jan. 30, 2018.
CCTV footage later revealed that Nasyrlayeva was last seen on Paton Bridge, leading prosecutors to conclude that she had died by suicide. Her body was never found.
Nasyrlayeva’s had sought help from her university’s dean of foreign students, Tetyana Timokhina, to receive a residency permit after her visa expired in December 2017. Timokhina reportedly refused to provide the necessary documents, which led to Nasyrlayeva’s automatic expulsion.
As a result, Timokhina was suspended from her duties as dean of foreign students at the university.
In both cases, universities allegedly failed to provide foreign students with critical institutional and emotional support in difficult situations. That is a recurring problem, says EMSA association leader Sarpong.
If Ukraine truly wants to “get in line with other European countries, they need to create a peaceful environment in which international students can learn,” he said.
