A PhD student has lodged a police report against his supervisors from University Malaya (UM) for allegedly stealing his work for their own ‘personal commercial interests’ and unfairly expelled him.
Speaking to Media Variasi, the PhD candidate – Yemen-national Abbod Ali Mohammed Saeed is studying a solution to a transportation issue that has never existed in Malaysia.
He elaborated that the solution uses Meshlium scanners in the Advance Intelligent Transportation System (AITS) to track vehicles. However, his system, research and PhD data were misused by 2 supervisors who were believed to be using it for their ‘personal commercial interests’.
Wow. Universiti Malaya what is this behaviour.. pic.twitter.com/tbUP7PjL5G
— ᶠᵃᵗ cat ˢᵃʸs ᴴeyy! (@JulesJulietta) August 28, 2022
“The supervisor offered me to use the project within the university’s research company and we shared the patent rights according to the university’s rules and laws,” he said.
“However, after the study was completed in 2017, the password to access my system was suddenly changed and the supervisor informed me that the system had become the property of his company which had nothing to do with the university.”
“I reported this issue to the university management, however, the supervisor asked me to continue the study because he claimed that it was not complete. The supervisor also did not allow me to use the equipment to complete the study because he claimed it belonged to his company.”
Abbod said the university later promised to resolve the issue by extending 3 semesters and providing the necessary equipment, to which, he later found out that there is no such equipment available in the university laboratory.
“During the second semester, last April, I was shocked to receive a letter of sudden termination of studies. I felt mistreated, bullied and used for their benefit,” he said.
On 14 August, he lodged a police report and in the affidavit letter, he claimed to have all the evidence and documents confirming that the ideas, proposals, papers and research data were his.
Also in case org lupa. Sampai ke sudah dia senyap je. U know why? Yes. Same thing here. https://t.co/JOQlVciqWh
— Enable_Disabled_Grad 🇲🇾💐 (@ASariyathul) August 29, 2022
The university’s response
In response to Abbod’s claim, UM has filed another police report over the accusations and said it is reviewing if appropriate legal action can be taken.
UM also explained that it is always the university’s policy that research undertaken using its facilities remained the property of the university.
It added that Abbod had been unable to complete his studies despite being sponsored for an extra three semesters beyond the maximum of 12 semesters. However, it said that Abbod was still unable to complete his studies within the extended period.
Stay tuned for more updates!
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