By Emmanuel Egobiambu
A file photo of a classroom in Nigeria during the COVID-19 pandemic. Credit: Sodiq Adelakun/Channels Television
The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) is worried over the recent hike in fees by varsities across the country, saying it may force many students out of school.
Many public universities have in recent months increased their tuition fees owing to what they described as the country’s economic realities.
While some of them have made a downward review after protests by students, the National President of ASUU Professor Emmanuel Osodeke is afraid parents/guardians would find it difficult to pay the new fees.
“Today, universities are arbitrarily increasing tuition fees,” he said on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics.
“Is that correct in an environment today where the minimum wage is N30,000 per month and where they have to pay rent and pay heavily for transportation? And you are enforcing this thing on the students?
“As a result of this – I can assure you that you can check if nothing is done about this heavy fee being introduced all over the country today – in the next two or three years, more than 40 to 50 per cent of these students who are in school would drop out. ”
According to him, if such happens, these students would become willing tools in the hands of those who want to make the “country ungovernable”.
“That is what we are saying: create the environment we had in the ’60s and ’70s,” the ASUU chief said.
“When I was a student, the government was paying me for being a student. Let’s have an environment where the children of the poor can have access to education, not closing them. If you say school fees of N300,000, how can the children of somebody who earns N50,000 a month be able to pay such fee?”
To remedy the situation, Professor Osodeke asked the Federal Government to increase its educational budget “to at least 15 per cent from last year’s 3.8 per cent”. (Channels)
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