Education is seen as the natural way of preparing any child for his or her future to ensue that the child, when he or she enter the employment market will and is prepared to face the realities of adulthood. The rewards and the type of jobs or positions they secure would eventually commensurate with their educational achievements.

For those who succeed and move on to become undergraduates and thereafter attain their Masters degree or even a PhD, it would only reflect the achievement of the effort and time that was devoted to that field of study. Here the words of Tryon Edwards would be applicable, as he said:

"The great end of education is to discipline rather than to furnish the mind to train it to the use of its own powers, rather than fill it with the accumulation of others."

Whatever the standard of education a person may achieve, in the world of today, it comes with a twin objective. Some may take education for a living. Others may take on education for the purpose of making a living.

And there are others who diabolically obtain dubious or sham degrees from dubious institutions of higher learning. And we cannot leave out those who do not qualify to gain entry into local universities on merits but because of the quota system.

These are the people who will never realize what Bertrand Russell once famously remarked, when he said: "One's certainty varies inversely with ones knowledge."

These sham degree holders fail to realise that education is a life long learning process. How on earth do these sham degree holders masquerade in official circles as public figures or as civil servants?

How is it that the authorities are unaware of such prevailing shams? People in public office have been found to hold sham degrees, even.

These people have failed to recognise the fact as stated by Bertrand Russell that "We can only be certain of things we know by direct acquaintance." But they took a short cut, and chose to become, charlatans. This fact also applies to our local university graduates.

As Ahmad Sarji in the book entitled "Attaining Eminence" written by Lim Chang Moh, at page 218 states:

"Decades ago, before preferential entry was introduced, entry into university was strictly on merit. We had to compete on equal terms with the best. This was reflected in the quality of the people employed by the government during my time," he was quoted as saying in Graduan magazine in early 2008.

"But today, many students can enter local universities with the minimum of requirements. Coasting their way through the undergraduate years, passing with the barest of margins, they expect to get good jobs with their low passing marks."

With the above statement Ahmad Sarji posed the question, "What is the point of having highly qualified professionals if they don't have character?"

Maybe our government lives in cloud nine and we live on earth, and that is why our civil society is where it is today.

In ending this article it would be appropriate to quote what Henry Peter, Lord Brougham said on education:

"Education makes a people easy to lead, but difficult to drive, easy to govern, but impossible to enslave."

It is time that the government stops dishing out paper mill degrees to fulfil the quotas. These charlatans, who acquire dubious degrees from sham institutions, ultimately have no character.