By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Chief Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

AFTER more than a year-long presidential search, embattled former president Dr Rodney Smith has been selected to return to the helm of the College of the Bahamas.

Education Minister Jerome Fitzgerald yesterday confirmed that the College Council will now engage Dr Smith in negotiations for a three-year contract, with the option to renew.

It is not clear how long the negotiations will take, however College Council Chairman Alfred Sears said he expects parties will be able to finalise an agreement in a short time.

The announcement that Cabinet had approved the recommendation by Mr Fitzgerald and the College Council to appoint Dr Smith comes days after union leaders expressed their disappointment over the delay in a selection.

Yesterday, Mr Fitzgerald explained that his decision to support the Council’s recommendation was based on widespread consultation with the college, the wider community and international academics.

He noted that the overwhelming sentiment was that Dr Smith should be given the chance to lead the institution once he was genuinely repentant and had accepted responsibility for a 2005 plagiarism scandal. Mr Fitzgerald added that he was shocked to learn that the majority of opposition to the appointment came from the wider community, some of whom referred to plagiarism as a “cardinal sin”. He explained that these views were not as strongly held by the local academic community or international professionals.

Dr Smith was president of COB until he resigned in 2005 amid controversy.

While making a speech at a COB’s Honours Convocation in 2005, Dr Smith repeated a part of a speech used by then president of New York University Dr John Sexton without attribution.

Dr Smith has repeatedly defended himself against suggestions that he would not be a worthy COB president. He enjoys considerable support within the college community and has said that the scandal involved an unintentional omission by the person who drafted the remarks and that Dr Sexton had given him “carte blanche permission to use the document in whatever manner” he wished.

He emerged as the top pick of four short listed candidates to head the institution and was recommended to the Council by an appointed Advisory Search Committee (ASC).

While some, including businessman and former COB Council Chairman Franklyn Wilson, have made public statements opposing Dr Smith’s reappointment, Dr Smith reportedly enjoys widespread support within COB.

Mr Sears previously said that the appointed committee determined that Dr Smith was “best able to articulate the vision of the Council and the mandate of the Government for leading the College through the process of becoming recognised as a university in 2015.”

Emphasising that the search process was “open, fair, transparent and respectful of stakeholder interests,” he added that the plagiarism issue that led to Dr Smith’s departure from the college in 2005 was the only “question mark that hung over (his) candidacy for president.”

Yesterday, representatives of the Advisory Search Committee praised the government for its decision to support Dr Smith, and expressed confidence in the pending transition to university status.