Our elders will always say that
"you don't cure headache by cutting off the neck...The fact is; the whole body will die".
It is on this note that I want to address the latest development in our great citadel.
The University management has stated that only duly registered students of the 2015/2016 session are eligible to write the exams this week. Whilst I understand the stance of the school management, I also think that they are insensitive to the economic realities in the country. The University of Port Harcourt is a federal University and the fundamental reason why the federal institutions were instituted was to act as a palliative and make education accessible to all and sundry, especially the poor.
The economy is in shambles right now and by trickle extension, has affected so many families. Some students painstakingly self-fund themselves through school and the school management should not act obliviscent of that fact. Nobody ever graduates without paying all tuition in full and so the issue of circulating fee deadline memoranda is just an act of sheer cruelty.
The University of Port Harcourt is a Federal institution and not a private limited liability company. So I see no reason why the school management would always want to disadvantage the students by increasing fees indiscriminately every session.They fragment fee payments into statutory and nonstatutory and I am still yet to comprehend the dichotomy between them.
There are some basic infrastructural facilities that need to be put in place but the school management have turned blind eyes to that.All they want is to bring pain and sufferings to Nigerian students.
Abuja campus at night is always very dark and unsafe amidst the constant electricity available. What will I take to light up the whole campus? Why are there no adequate classrooms? Why should students learn at the stadium or the arena? These are salients issues that are to be addressed first before thinking of bringing burdens to the students.
There are no jobs for those that have graduated already and they still want the ones in school to repeat because of some outlandish reasons. Why should any right thinking student agree to repeat a class when they know that even after graduation, they'll still have to start another phase of societal struggles?
I want to unequivocally resound that the protest is a right step in the right direction. The President of the country has asked Nigerians to be patient. We Nigerian students are also asking the school management to be patient too. We don't want any deadline because there is no money anywhere period! When the money comes, we will pay because we can't graduate without paying all outstanding fees.
Therefore, I want to call on all Unique students to come out en masse and express their grievances tomorrow. I think it is an absolute bereftness of reasoning for the school management to cut off the students from the school system.
I reiterate that if the head is aching, you don't cut off the neck.
God bless us!
EndieUMUNNA.
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