LACK OF ETHICS AT THE

UNIVERSITY OF THE REPUBLIC

OF MONTEVIDEO, URUGUAY

"How often since then have I had to experience that talent by the grace of God in the struggle for existence came to a wretched end in a beggar's coat, while the pseudo-scholars and the lazy ones grew fat and attained rich livings on the path of nepotism!"

Nobody is a prophet in his own land (Mt 13,53-58; Mc 6,1-16; Lc 4,16-30)... unless he has good sponsors. (Anonymous).

Montevideo, 17 February 1999

My name is Juan José Castillos, I am an egyptologist, I am a Uruguayan and Canadian citizen and I work as professor at the Uruguayan Institute of Egyptology in Montevideo since 1984. I have published research on my subject in several countries.

The events to which I am going to refer took place a few years ago and reflect very badly on the way things are done at the University of the Republic at Montevideo, Uruguay.

My intention is to make people aware of this situation, not only for my own sake, but for that of others who may be going through the same ordeal, in the hope that international condemnation might bring about a change of attitude in that university.

On February 20, 1989, Luis Bausero, a person who at the time was holding the Chair of Ancient History at the Faculty of Humanities of the University of the Republic here, granted an interview to a local newspaper in which his opinions on an Egyptian mummy kept at a local museum were in more than 90% word by word part of a text published by the writer years before. No credit or mention was given to the author, which in any civilized country is considered blatant plagiarism and is against the law, besides being a gross misconduct when it is done by an academic.

The incident was transmitted to the authorities of the Faculty where this person worked, including proof of the deed, but no action was taken, I repeated the complaint several months later, with the same result.

In 1968-1970 I had risked my life as many others did in public demonstrations in the street as a student of that university to defend its autonomy when it was threatened, so I felt I deserved some respect.

At the time the university was going through a period of severe confrontation with the government due mainly to budgetary cutbacks and the writer preferred to delay his action in order to avoid unnecessary embarrassment to the university at that difficult time and in the hope that steps would eventually be taken.

This naive and unsuccessful gesture ended when the Rector of the University, Jorge Brovetto, sent me a letter in which he washed his hands concerning the affair and hinted that legal action could be taken by the writer. This, of course, after I had learnt that the delay in taking action had led to the expiry of the period the laws of the country allowed for such a procedure.

When I published   a letter in a local newspaper (press here to read it)  making the affair public so that they would feel compelled by the pressure of public opinion to do something about the damaging situation to the prestige of the university, the only result was that the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, Carlos Zubillaga, replied in the same newspaper with an insulting letter in which he threatened the writer for making use of his right to complain publicly about it.

After I replied in the press with further revelations on the matter, not a word was read from this person on the subject although I publicly mentioned his name several times.

Some time later, I appealed to the local organization Uruguay Transparente, a branch of Transparency International, an anti-corruption organization with central offices in Germany, which was carrying out a campaign against corruption in Uruguay. This organization was presided at the time by Dra. Jacinta Balbela, one-time President of the Supreme Court of Justice of Uruguay, and other members were Dr. Lescano, Academic Advisor to the Rector of the University of the Republic as well as other personalities and respected community leaders.

This Committee accepted to study my case and after six months ruled in my favour, specifically mentioning that if the legal period had not expired, they would have advised that the matter should have been put before a court of law.

After this ruling, that was published in the local press, the university insisted in not taking any action against the person accused of violations of the most elementary rules of academic ethical behaviour and of my rights as author of the appropriated material.

What is even more incredible is that the person responsible for those violations, whose only response to my public accusations was to try to blame the journalist who interviewed him, a weak and ridiculous claim because after the publication he never published a clarification nor apologized to the author, minimum actions to establish some sort of credibility, shortly after the ruling was made Professor Emeritus by the University of the Republic and retired as an honoured member of his Faculty...

Let us point out as well that this person in the many years he occupied his Chair at the university, never published any research and was recently branded in an article by another person in the local press as an illiterate, because of some opinions he had made public (J. Ortiz de Taranco, "The infinite mistakes by Mr. Bausero", "La República", 4 November 1997). He did not respond at all to such serious public accusation against him.

The Rector involved, responsible for the protection of ethics at his university, and who took no action on the matter, was appointed afterwards President of the Latin American Association of Universities...

The Uruguayan National Academy of Letters, presided by Antonio Cravotto and with Carlos Jones Gaye as secretary, of which this person was a member, ignored a letter we sent them including relevant evidence and after these events not only elected him as vicepresident but also defended his public image in many ways.

We think that in any civilized country where there is respect for ethics, this situation would not have been tolerated and for the sake of salvaging whatever is possible from this sad train of events, is that I disclose the facts in an international forum.

There is more to be said about Luis Bausero’s behaviour at this university and elsewhere which caused me considerable material and moral harm (article published in "El Editorial" of Montevideo, 4 July 1994), and which would be unthinkable anywhere else... but in Uruguay apparently it seems to be perfectly acceptable.

For instance, in the "contest" in which Bausero strived to have his assistant, Gloria Franco, appointed to succeed him without a contest, with the complicity of other teaching staff such as Vicente Cicalese, Germán D´Elía and Rosita Alonso, on the basis of "merits", perhaps to hide the lack of merits and academic publications of his assistant, only the opposition of another member of the faculty, Diana Bianchi, prevented this and led to the "contest", with the shameful procedures and results outlined in the link I give immediately above these lines.

How would you define a university that grants top qualifications in a contest for a chair to a semi-illiterate person, as you can see from the above mentioned documents that you can read and that are a true reflection of the official file on that contest, a copy of which is in my possession? This person has been holding a teaching position there and in all these years this person´s academic output as far as research is concerned, has been NOTHING, which makes this situation more grotesque than anybody could imagine.

In spite of all the time that has passed with those responsible enjoying full impunity for such deeds, I am convinced that many academics in the university where it all happened are honourable people and I hope they will take action to restore the rule of respect for the rights of others to their intellectual property, provided international public pressure makes them aware of the seriousness of the situation.

This is the action I would expect you to take if you agree with my view of the affair. For the purpose, you may contact the University of the Republic at the fax number 598 2 408 0303 or the government at the fax number 598 2 203 0340.

Finally, I would like to thank the many verbal and written testimonies of solidarity received by the writer from Uruguayan and foreign academics, which expressed in very strong words their repudiation of such deeds or the lack of adequate response to them by the authorities.

If you wish to download to your computer or read some of these messages received from around the world, press here: MESSAGES.

FAX: 598 2 622 5352

Address: 4 de Julio 3068 Montevideo

CP 11600 URUGUAY

NOTE - As an example of the situations that this unresolved matter encourages, recently, at another Faculty of the same university, the Dean had to resign after winning a contest for a Chair at his Faculty with a thesis in which he used parts of books by other authors without mentioning the source. Only after the other person who participated in the contest put forward a claim assisted by her lawyer, the Dean resigned. However, a group of professors of that Faculty were quoted in the local press declaring that the Dean represented the best traditions of that university and that they expected him to be back teaching there as soon as possible... The comments are left to the reader.

There is a group of people in this country, allied to and apologists of unscrupulous individuals who do not respect the rights of others, besides many similar despicable practices, who seem to consider their behaviour to be a great merit and fervently wish to be remembered for their association with such "academics".

These people can be sure that as long as it takes, I will try to do my best so that I can help them attain this goal.

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