Students protest ‘arbitrary hike’ in LASU fees, others

Storm Fashola’s office

Disrupt activities at Lagos House

BY OLASUNKANMI AKONI & BOSE ADELAJA

LAGOS—Irate students yesterday, disrupted normal activities at the Lagos House, Alausa, office of

Governor Babatunde Fashola as they barricaded the entrance protesting what they described as “arbitrary hike” in school fees at the Lagos State University, LASU.

Led by Mr. Sunday Ashefun, the students besieged the office of the governor around 1pm and demanded among others; for the governor to immediately reduce the hike in LASU School fees, Federal Government should honour 2010 agreement entered with Colleges of Education Academic Staff Union, COASU and Academic Staff Union of Polytechnic and other staff unions

The placard carrying students who were ushered in at about 2.30pm, also demanded for the implementation of 20 per cent  budgetary allocation  to education as recommended by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation, UNESCO, conversion of  Higher  National Diploma, HND, to Bachelor of Technology, (B.Tech.) and reinstatement of all banned unions  by the management, such as University of Lagos, UNILAG, College of Education, Ikere, Ekiti State among others.

The students also demanded for the removal of supervising minister for Ministry of Education with immediateeffect before it is too late.
The students who said they were against victimisation of student union leaders in LASU, condemned plans by federal and state governments to introduce new tuition fee in the various campuses.

He said the increase had had its toll on the students of the institution as some of them had dropped out because they couldn’t afford to pay.
Ashefun described the situation as appalling, saying Nigerian students would not take anything less than a reduction of the “arbitrary fees “

“The fees are not just affordable, some of our colleagues have opted out of LASU simply because they cannot pay the N250,000 to N350,000 school fees.
“ These prohibitively high fees are some of the highest paid by any university in the country.Children of the poor can no more attend LASU and this is sad,” he said.

Fashola, who later addressed the aggrieved students, commended their comportment, saying it was a joint decision to increase LASU school fees after series of deliberations.
He explained that the hike in school fees was aimed at saving the school from total collapse as lecturers were leaving in droves for greener pastures.