A group under the aegis of Parents of Students of Federal University Lokoja (FUL) have called for immediate removal of the Vice Chancellor of the university, Prof. Olayemi Akinwumi, over what they described as “arbitrary hike in the proposed students’ school fees” without recourse to the current economic situation in the country.
The parents, while embarking on protest in Lokoja, Tuesday, said the protest would continue until the management of the university reverses itself.
Leader of the group, Mr Moses Abraham, who made the call while addressing newsmen, saying the 300 percent increase was orchestrated to deny parents and Nigerian masses the privilege to acquire university education for their children.
Reeling the breakdown of the current hike in the students’ fees, Abraham explained that , the remedial course which has N50,000 as school fees is now N100,000 while fees for new intake science student which was formerly N56,000 has now increased to N188,500.
He added that the fees for new intake art/social sciences hitherto fixed for N55,000 has been increased to N183,500 just as returning students are expected to pay N113,000 as against the former fees of N47,000.
According to him, students’ accommodation per bed space which was charged for N20,000 before has been hiked by the Vice Chancellor to N60,000 while the GST hand book sold to students at N1,500 per copy has now increased to N6,500.
Lamenting further, the parents spokesman said the increment was too much for them to bear and called on the federal government through the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu to prevail on the vice chancellor in order to reverse the hike in the fees.
“The Vice Chancellor is a civil servant and we expected that he should be aware of the current economic doldrum the people of this country are passing through recently. How can people pay their children school fees with the current increment when sources of income remain stagnated,” he stated.
