Free of Fear

By Hussain Al-Shahristani

Free of fear is about a man who overcame his fear to say no to Saddam Hussein when he wanted him to work on a nuclear weapons programme. The book vividly describes the atrocities of Saddam’s tyranny and how he and other inmates survived in Abu Ghraib prison. He overcame his fear again when he defied Saddam by escaping from prison after spending ten years in solitary confinement.

After the fall of the regime, he was called upon to assume different ministerial positions and played leading roles in new Iraq. This book is an eyewitness account of five decades of modern Iraq with all its turmoil and challenges. It describes successes and failures at nation-building endeavours.

Autobiography of Hussain Al-Shahristani is a mirror of recent Iraq’s history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Mar 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9781665581370

Hussain Al-Shahristani

Hussain Al-Shahristani served as Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Affairs in Iraq from 2010 to 2014. He also served as Minister of Oil and Minister of Higher Education. A graduate of Imperial College in London and University of Toronto, he started his professional life as a nuclear scientist at the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission in 1970. Al-Shahristani was sent to prison when he refused to work on Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapon programme. He spent ten years in solitary confinement at Abu-Ghraib prison. He managed to escape from the notorious prison in a daring adventure and lived in Iran and the UK as a refugee. He was awarded the “Freedom from Fear 2012”, one of the Four Freedoms Award by Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute. After the fall of Saddam Hussein, he returned to Iraq and actively participated in the reconstruction of the country. He left government and focuses now on humanitarian work in Iraq.

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FREE OF

FEAR

HUSSAIN AL-SHAHRISTANI

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© 2021 Hussain Al-Shahristani. All rights reserved.

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Published by AuthorHouse 03/22/2021

ISBN: 978-1-6655-8138-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6655-8137-0 (e)

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CONTENTS

Prologue

Chapter 1 Childhood

Chapter 2 At University

Chapter 3 Atomic Energy Commission

Chapter 4 Political Activity

Chapter 5 Prison

Chapter 6 Intelligence Service

Chapter 7 Escape

Chapter 8 Fall of Saddam

Chapter 9 Political Developments

Chapter 10 Ministry of Oil

Chapter 11 Petroleum Licensing Rounds

Chapter 12 Deputy Prime Minister

Chapter 13 ISIS

Chapter 14 The Unaoil Case

Chapter 15 Abadi Government

Chapter 16 Ministry of Higher Education

Epilogue

To the memory of Berniece, who shared with me the hardships

of standing up to tyranny and lived to help the oppressed.

PROLOGUE

In December 1979, I had to make a choice: either work on Saddam Hussein’s nuclear weapon programme or pay a price. The choice was simple, and the price turned out to be eleven years and three months in prison, ten years of which was in solitary confinement. When I made that choice, it didn’t cross my mind that I would one day write a book about that decision. Then, I was more concerned about how to explain myself to my interrogators.

After graduating with a degree in nuclear science from the University of Toronto, I returned to my home country, Iraq, to put my knowledge to the service of the people. The regime wanted me to work on its military nuclear programme. I declined and explained that my scientific training was not in the field of bomb-making.

After I was severely tortured, the head of Iraqi Intelligence forcefully told me that it is the duty of every citizen to serve his country, and those who refuse to serve their country do not deserve to be alive.

I replied, I agree that it is everyone’s duty to serve his country, but what you are asking me may not be a service to my country.

I was kept at the notorious Abu Ghraib Prison. Despite the harsh conditions, I was luckier than tens of thousands of my countrymen who lost their lives in the struggle for freedom.

In 1991, during the second Kuwait war, I managed to escape from Abu Ghraib. I took refuge in different countries, exposing human rights violations in Iraq and organising humanitarian assistance for Iraqi refugees.

After the fall of Saddam’s regime in 2003, I returned to Iraq and assumed different positions. I served as the First Deputy Speaker of the Transitional National Assembly (2005), Minister of Oil (2006–2010), Deputy Prime Minister for Energy Affairs (2010–2014), and Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research (2014–2016). I witnessed various political discussions and developments. My recollection and views of these developments are presented in the second half of the book.

From my life experiences, there is a lot to learn about living and working under a totalitarian tyrant and the difficult task of nation-building for a society transitioning to a free democratic system while facing terrorism as well as sectarian and ethnic divisions.

CHAPTER 1

Childhood

The city of Karbala in Iraq was celebrating the birthday anniversary of Imam Hussain, the grandson of Prophet Muhammad, on the night of 15 August 1942, when my father, sitting in his guest house, was told that my mother had given birth to a son. Name him Hussain, he said. Our house was adjacent to the sanctuary of Imam Hussain. My father’s guest house was open day and night to receive visitors who came to visit the mausoleum and stay for a few days, as there were no hotels or restaurants in Karbala in those days.

At the time, my father was the head of the Shahristani family that has settled in Karbala since my great-great-grandfather, Sayed Muhammad Mahdi Al-Shahristani, emigrated to the town in 1723. In the guest house, every afternoon, people of all strata of society would gather to discuss the town affairs, exchange news on political developments, or seek my father’s help to resolve some local disputes. As a child, I would sit in a corner, listening to what the grown-ups discussed and hearing how different views were expressed on any one issue. I was overtaken by the wisdom of these grown-ups.

Sayed Ibrahim, my father, was one of Karbala’s most prominent social figures in the first half of the twentieth century. He owned extensive agricultural lands north of the city. His father, Sayed Saleh, was a key figure in the town during the Ottoman rule, and he was the son of Sayed Muhammad Hussain, one of the renowned religious scholars of the time. However, the most famous of my ancestors in Karbala was Sayed Muhammad Mahdi, who is considered the founding father of the Shahristani family in Karbala.

Sayed Muhammad Mahdi is known as one of the four Mahdis who studied under Sheikh Wahid Al Bihbahani. In the eighteenth century, they jointly established the Usuli School of Thought in the Shia tradition in Iraq. The Shahristani family are descendants of Prophet Muhammad. Their ancestors moved between Arabia and Iraq and settled in Ain al-Tamar, the closest site to Karbala, where spring water was available at that time.

Early Memories

When I was a twelve-year-old boy, Mujtaba Nawab Safavi, founder of the Fedayeen Islam Organization in Iran, came to Karbala and was our guest. The mayor of Karbala warned my father that Mr Safavi was an opponent of the Shah of Iran; he said the government did not approve of his activities and my father should not facilitate his talks in the city. However, my father did not heed the warning and organised a large public meeting at the Imam Hussain sanctuary.

Nawab Safavi preached that getting rid of dictators in Muslim countries was more effective in freeing people than fighting colonial powers who wanted to plunder their natural resources. He was a powerful speaker and inflamed his audience, calling on them to rise against corrupt rulers. His oration had a substantial impact on me at that early age.

Nawab Safavi toured the Middle East in 1954, visiting Iraq, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, giving speeches and raising enthusiasm in each country he visited. After returning from this tour, he was arrested for carrying out revolutionary activities in Iran, sentenced to death, and executed in 1956. This news saddened those of us who met him and listened to him in Karbala.

I also remember the Palestine war in 1948 when I was in the first grade of Sibt Elementary School. We were told that Iraqi army units would pass through the town on their way to Palestine to help the people defend themselves against the occupation of their lands. We rushed out of the school to greet the soldiers who passed through the town and offered them flowers and cakes, and the soldiers waved at us. That image remained stuck in my mind, and I was hurt by the injustice done to the Palestinians.

Another event that shocked me when I was a child was the military attack on Egypt in July 1956 after Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalised the Suez Canal. Israel invaded the Sinai Peninsula and was quickly joined by Britain and France, who landed in the Suez Canal area. This aggression infuriated the Arab world. We, the high school students, came out with noisy demonstrations condemning the attack and criticising the Iraqi government for not taking a strong stance against it. The Karbala police chief came to my father and complained that his son was one of the instigators of the anti-government demonstrations. Still, my father did not say anything to me and was sympathetic to our resentment.

The Revolt of 1920

Before moving on, I should mention the patriotic role my father and his cousin, Sayed Hebat al-Din Al-Shahristani, played in countering the British occupation of Iraq during World War I. In 1914, the Shia religious leaders in Iraq urged the people to stand up and resist the British invasion. Iraqi tribes fought the invading forces courageously for three years, but it was unrealistic to expect them to win a war against the British imperial army. In 1917, the commander of the British forces, Lieutenant General Stanley Maude, entered Baghdad and declared, We have come to liberate you, not to occupy your country.

However, after defeating the Ottomans, the British and the French divided the Ottoman Empire’s spoils. British Foreign Minister Mark Sykes and his French counterpart, François Georges-Picot, met in 1916 and agreed to put Iraq and Palestine under British rule and Syria and Lebanon under the French, according to what became known as the Sykes-Picot Agreement, when the British were promising the Iraqis liberation from Ottoman rule.

In Iraq, when people realised that their country was put under British mandate, large public meetings were held, and people were incited to resist the new occupation. The highest religious leader, Ayatollah Mirza Muhammad Taqi Shirazi, issued a fatwa to resist British occupation and appointed a council of five religious scholars to lead the resistance, one of whom was Sayed Hebat al-Din Al-Shahristani. The council began its work with great vigour, calling on the Iraqi tribes to fight the occupiers and urging them to take up arms to defend their homeland’s independence. At the forefront of the Mujahedeen was Hebat al-Din. My father, Sayed Ibrahim, was his lieutenant.

The British forces managed to suppress the revolution and arrested its leaders. Hebat al-Din and my father were sentenced to death; others were deported to Hangam Island at the entrance to the Persian Gulf. However, the revolution eventually succeeded in getting Britain to recognise Iraq’s independence. The Iraqi resistance leaders were pardoned, and the occupying administration conceded to work with them to establish a modern independent state. Hebat al-Din Al-Shahristani became the minister of education in the first Iraqi government, headed by Abdul Rahman al-Naqib.

Mahrouth al-Hadhal

My father, Sayed Ibrahim, died in the fall of 1957 and was buried in the sanctuary of Imam Hussain, opposite his guest house. He left us a vast agricultural land shared between him and Mahrouth al-Hadhal, the chief sheikh of the Iniza tribe, one of the largest tribes in Arabia. Al Saud, the rulers of Saudi Arabia, is a branch of this tribe, and so are the rulers of other Gulf States.

When King Abdulaziz Al Saud visited Iraq in 1957, he came to pay respect to Sheikh Mahrouth in his quarters north of Karbala because tribal norms require that the chief sheikh be visited by members of the tribe, even if he is a king. When I was a young boy, Sheikh Mahrouth gave me an authentic Arabian mare and a rifle. I was very proud of the Arabian mare and was so sorry to part with her when I had to travel abroad to pursue my university education.

Sheikh Mahrouth frequented my father’s guest house in Karbala, and one day, he came and told my father, You and I have never differed in our partnership, but we do not know if our children will be the same. I suggest that we divide our shared lands so that each knows his.

My father responded, Fine, let one of us divide the land, and the other will choose.

Mahrouth said, You divide, and I choose.

So they did.

A few days later, Mahrouth came to our place and asked my father, Have you seen a man spit on the ground and try to lick it back?

My father immediately replied, Sheikh, the whole land is yours.

But the sheikh insisted, No, we remain partners.

I did not understand what had happened, and that evening I asked my father what the sheikh meant. He explained that he had agreed to divide the land at his request, but later, he regretted and wanted to cancel the deal. He had given his word, and he was ashamed to retract it and likened it to spit that comes out of the mouth and cannot be taken back. I learned from that Bedouin sheikh the value of one’s word.

The 14 July Revolution

On 14 July 1958, I was at secondary school when a military coup toppled the monarchy in Iraq and General Abdul Karim Qassim took over power. At the time, I was on summer vacation with my older brother in Mashhad, Iran, to visit Imam Reza’s shrine, and we learned of the coup from the radio. My brother and I rushed to visit Sayed Hebat al-Din, who was also spending the summer in Mashhad and by then had lost his eyesight. Hebat al-Din dictated to me a couplet that he composed on the spot, welcoming the change.

The revolution received strong popular support as it raised slogans of freeing Iraq from foreign dominance and support for the Palestinian people. But soon rivalries among pro-revolution parties began, and demonstrations and counterdemonstrations in the streets turned violent. On the one hand, the nationalists called for Arab unity, demanding immediate unification with Syria and Egypt. On the other, the Communist-led leftists raised the slogan of a federal union with those same countries.

At that early age and beginning of my political awareness, I noticed the hollowness of political slogans, as I could not find much difference between an immediate unity or a federation followed later by full integration. But under these banners, fights broke out on the streets, blood spilt, and politics divided people even within the same family. Large massacres were committed in Mosul, Kirkuk, and other cities, and people were murdered and their bodies dragged on the road. Iraq was under a reign of terror; the Communists considered religion as the opium of the masses and the cause of the backwardness of the society.

I noted that the Baathists, whose party was secular, courted religious leaders, both Sunni and Shia, to organise religious festivals to counter the Communists. I attended one of the large festivals in Karbala to mark the birth of Imam Hussain, which was attended by Sunni scholars. In return, another festival at Abu Hanifa Mosque in Baghdad was attended by Shia scholars. Watching the secular Baathists engage in such religious activities, I realised how such parties could hide behind banners to conceal their true agenda to mislead the masses.

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CHAPTER 2

At University

Scholarship to Russia

In 1959, I graduated from Karbala High School. In the general baccalaureate exam, I was the top student in the city and the second in the country. The government sent the top high school graduates abroad to study on scholarship. I applied to study engineering and was accepted. My name was the second on the scholarship department’s published list, and I was approved to go to the UK for my university studies.

When I went to the department to complete the scholarship forms, I found a handwritten arrow in front of my name, indicating my study destination was the Soviet Union. Somebody from down the list had pulled a favour to take my place in the UK. At this early stage in life, I developed strong dislike to favouritism and corruption.

We began preparing to leave with the other students who were offered scholarships in the Soviet Union, and in the fall of 1959, forty of us took an Iraqi Airways Vickers Viscounts plane to Moscow. We were the first group of international students to arrive in Moscow, along with some students from Cuba. I noticed that most Iraqi students came to study engineering, while the Cubans came to study medicine.

We arrived at Moscow airport and were surprised by the snow on the buildings and roads; we had never seen snow before. We were taken to a college to study the Russian language. At the college residence, a room was allocated for four students: two Russians and two Iraqis. The purpose of this was for Russian students to practice English with us and vice versa, but in fact, we were not fluent in English. So I decided to join English classes with Russian students as well as Russian lessons. Within a few months, I learned Russian with such proficiency that it was difficult to distinguish me as an international student.

The second thing that surprised us was the food that was so different from our Iraqi cuisine. About a week after we arrived in Moscow, I felt severe stomach pain and was taken to the hospital. The doctor diagnosed the condition as appendicitis and said I must undergo surgery immediately. I was taken into the operating room, and an anaesthetic solution was injected into my abdomen. But in fact, it wasn’t very effective because I was in great pain when the doctor opened my abdominal area to remove my appendix, and I felt the tingling of needles when I was stitched up.

I finished studying Russian and entered the Mendeleev Institute, one of the best Soviet institutes for chemical studies. It is named after the Russian scientist who discovered the periodic table of elements. At this institute, I was the only Iraqi student and spent all my time with students from the Soviet Republics of different nationalities, mostly Russians. What caught my attention was the Russians’ simplicity and kindness and their lack of knowledge about people and cultures outside the Soviet Union.

Memories from Moscow

In the Soviet schools, the world map was painted with the Soviet Union in red at the centre, marked with a hammer and sickle, and the rest of the world, without borders, in white. Our classmates asked us the most innocent questions about Iraq and how its people live. When we told them that our region is a desert, unlike theirs, they could not comprehend it because there was no television in their homes or in the student residence. Even the radios in our rooms were limited to one Russian station.

Once a classmate asked me, When you smile, is your smile in Arabic or Russian?

At the end of my first year at the Mendeleev Institute, I was honoured as the top student in our class. International students were not obliged to study Marxist philosophy and the Bolshevik Revolution, which were compulsory for the Soviet students. I chose to study both subjects and also scored higher marks than my Russian classmates.

One of the teachers I admired most was our math teacher. He would start his morning lecture by giving us a brief forecast of the weather for that day, and he was always correct. I asked him one day how he could forecast the weather so correctly.

He answered with a smile, I listen to the weather forecast in the morning before I come to the class and tell you the opposite, and I have not made a mistake yet. This professor seeded the love of mathematics in me and taught us calculus in such a way that all the students loved the subject, in contrast to math teaching elsewhere that puts students off.

While I was studying in Moscow, Nikita Khrushchev ruled the Soviet Union. He began his reign criticising the cruel policies of Stalin, his predecessor, who executed thousands of Communist Party comrades and caused millions of citizens to perish in his doomed agriculture policy in the kolkhozes. Ironically, Khrushchev himself was an ardent supporter of Stalin and carried out his savage orders without mercy. In 1938, when he was a party official in Moscow, he received an arrest warrant for thirty-five thousand opponents to the regime and was ordered to execute five thousand of them, without identifying those wanted. Khrushchev carried out the order enthusiastically and, within two weeks, sent his report to Stalin that he had arrested 41,305 enemies and executed about eighty-five hundred of them.

But when he came to power after Stalin’s death in 1953, he launched a smear campaign against Stalin and his policies. He criticised his bloody tactics against his comrades and oppression of the people, promising to ease restrictions, restore freedoms, and improve people’s standard of living.

At one of the party meetings, a comrade wrote him a note, If you were not content with Stalin’s policies, why didn’t you object when you were with him?

Khrushchev shouted angrily, Who wrote this clip? No one answered. Then he smiled and said, For the same reason you didn’t dare present yourself. He was known for his jokes in meetings and public speeches.

On 12 April 1961, Yuri Gagarin set off to space on the Vostok spacecraft. He stayed 108 minutes and circled the planet for one orbit, reaching an altitude of 327 kilometres above the Earth’s surface. Before that, the Soviet Union had sent a dog named Laika into space in 1957, but she died on the flight. The Soviets erected a monument in her honour in front of the space research centre in Moscow. Ironically, Yuri Gagarin, the man who flew to space and returned safely, died in 1968 while flying a MiG-15 warplane when it crashed during its maiden flight.

To England

In the summer of 1961, I returned to Iraq to see my mother and the family. I travelled by train from Moscow to Odessa, then by sea to Istanbul, and finally by land to Baghdad. By then, Iraq’s political climate had changed, and the Communist Party control on state institutions had receded. An acquaintance, who was director-general at the ministry of education, suggested that I apply for a transfer to the UK that was my original scholarship destination. I applied for a transfer to the UK, and my request was granted.

I flew to London and stayed at a hotel near the Iraqi embassy on Queen’s Gate in South Kingston. I went to see the cultural attaché at the embassy and was directed to go to Ipswich, about sixty miles north-west of London, to attend A-level GCE courses at Ipswich Civic College. High school graduates would typically spend two years to obtain a GCE certificate to be admitted to a university. I managed to finish my studies in one year and received high grades in subjects required for university admission in engineering disciplines.

My first impression trying to blend with the students at the college was that it was more difficult making friends here, unlike Russia, but the students were more familiar with the world and other cultures than Russians. Their interest in domestic and foreign politics was minimal, and they were much more interested in sports and dating. One day, I asked fellow students in our class who the prime minister of Britain was. Only a few students answered correctly, although Harold Macmillan was a well-known Labour politician.

At the college, five of us Iraqi students spent most of our time together. We decided to learn to drive and found that the cheapest way was to buy an old car and practice with it. So the five of us bought an old Austin A30 for twenty-five pounds, each paying five pounds, and we all learned how to drive and got our driving licenses. We left the car for the other Iraqi students who come to the college.

The holy month of Ramadan that year was in February. After fasting the month, we decided to go to London to look for a mosque to celebrate the Eid. On arrival in London, we asked a policeman at the train station about a nearby mosque. Searching his booklet, he told us the nearest mosque was in Woking, about twenty miles from London. We went there, but the imam at the mosque told us that Eid would be tomorrow. He invited us to stay the night in the mosque hall to help prepare food for the next day. He served each of us with a fifty-kilo bag of potatoes and asked us to peel them and cut them to be ready before dawn. Such was how we spent the first Eid holiday night in England.

Imperial College

I finished the A-level GSC course with straight As in four subjects and was offered a place at Imperial College of Science and Technology in the Chemical Engineering Department. Imperial College was one of the most prestigious universities in the UK, and it was a great privilege to study there.

The dean of the department, Professor A Ubbelohde, was a well-known chemist and a member of the Royal Society. Prof. Ubbelohde was focused on his studies and rarely met faculty members; his secretary, Miss Green, practically ran the department. One morning, Miss Green came to our class and told me that the dean wanted to see me. I was nervous and feared that he thought I didn’t meet his department’s standard.

I went to the appointment. Prof. Ubbelohde asked me to sit down and said that he was reviewing the new students’ names this year and noticed that I was from Iraq.

Then he asked me, Do you know what the ancient Iraqis have contributed to humanity?

I told him that we learned in our history lessons about the Sumerians, Babylonians, Assyrians, and the Islamic civilisation.

He said, "I am very interested in the history of science, and I want you to know that two of the three most important inventions in the history of mankind were made in Iraq and the third in Egypt.

"The first invention was the ‘wheel,’ which facilitated the transport of goods between the first human settlements that paved the way for the emergence of the early civilisations. The oldest four-wheeled vehicle was made in Ur, one of the most important city-states of the Sumerians at around 3500 BC.

"The second invention was the ‘lever,’ which enabled man to lift stones too heavy for muscle strength. The ancient Egyptians invented the lever, and they used it to raise heavy stones and rocks to build pyramids and other temples. It was invented around 2500 BC.

"The third invention was ‘zero,’ i.e., the decimal numerical system. Calculations until the end of Roman times were based on Roman numerals, which used symbols for tens, hundreds, and thousands that made simple calculations difficult. The decimal system adopted the zero, i.e., ten is written 1 and zero, one hundred as 1 and two zeros, etc. This decimal numerical system was introduced by Muhammad bin Musa al-Khwarizmi in Baghdad around 820 AD in his book A Brief on the Calculation of Algebra and Balancing. The concept of zero was known more than a century earlier in India. Still, the development of the decimal arithmetic system was by al-Khwarizmi, the father of algebra and the founder of mathematics."

He then asked if I would go to visit my family in Iraq during the summer holiday. I told him I was planning to. He said he would appreciate it if I found any old book on science history to buy it for him. I left his office feeling very proud.

Studying at Imperial College was difficult, as we started our day early by attending lectures. In the afternoon, we took practical lessons in laboratories, and then we would go to the library and stay there till late at night to come home exhausted. Very distinguished professors made up the faculty at Imperial College. Many were awarded the Nobel Prize.

We set up a society for Muslim students at the college and arranged for a room at the student union for Friday prayers. Prof. Abdeslam and Dr Fatimi, professor of astronomy, would join us occasionally. We also organised some events to introduce other students to our countries, their ancient civilisations, and contemporary issues. These events paved the way for reaching out to Iraqi and Muslim students at other universities that led to establishing the Muslim Students Society in Britain.

A five-person committee was elected to administer the society, and I was the secretary of the committee. The society’s activities included publishing a newsletter and holding an annual meeting for its members on New Year’s Day to discuss issues of concern to Muslim students in their universities, and how they can better integrate into their new community. These meetings were held at mosques, as we did not have sufficient funds to rent halls or stay at hotels.

During one of our annual meetings held in the Cardiff Mosque, I used a compass to check the direction of Mecca and found that it was about 45 degrees off the direction indicated by the mosque’s Qibla. We decided to pray in the direction of the compass. The mosque’s imam, who was watching us pray, came to ask why we did not face the Qibla. I showed him the compass that pointed out the correct direction.

He was furious and shouted, Our ancestors came from Aden a century ago as sailors and built a mosque in this place. Now you want to change the Qibla and consider their prayers invalid. I don’t allow you to stay in our mosque.

Our pleas that it was cold outside, as we were at the end of December, and we had nowhere to go at night, fell on deaf ears. He insisted on kicking us out, and we had to cancel the meeting and return to our homes. My compass and I were blamed for that disaster.

My scholarship stipend in London was forty-five pounds a month; it was more than enough to cover all my needs, and I had some savings. I decided to invite my brother Hassan, who had just finished high school in Karbala, to join me in London and complete his studies here. He came and enrolled in a college in London, and we lived together on my stipend.

To Canada

I finished my Imperial College course in 1965 and earned a B.Sc. (Hons) degree in chemical engineering. I was the top student on graduation and was awarded the Finchley Award, which was bestowed on the senior year’s best student. The college made me an offer to complete my higher studies for