UNIJOS mgt bows to pressure, crashes school fees

Following protests by students of the University of Jos, UNIJOS, in Plateau State, the management of the institution says it has reduced tuition fees payable by its students.

This was as students of the institution prior to the decision, had reportedly staged a protest against the recent hike in tuition fees by the university management.

The students who were said to have been mobilised by leaders of the university’s Students Union Government, had allegedly blocked several roads leading to the university campus according to a recorded video which has since gone viral.

The protesting students had called out the university management over it’s recent increment of school fees and charges for other services rendered by the institution, demanding an immediate reversal of the increase.

The students said Nigerians were already going through a lot of hardship, hence the need for the authorities not to complicate the already bad situation with further fee increments.

Few days after, the institution’s Vice Chancellor, Professor Tanko Ishaya, in a telephone interview with newsmen announced that the institution has crashed its fees.

According to him, the decision to reduce the fees followed a series of negotiations between UNIJOS authorities, students and other stakeholders.

He said, “UNIJOS fees have been crashed from whatever that had been published before. In fact, students of non-science courses will now be paying N105,000. The science students will be paying N135,000 and N140,000 for laboratories; so we have crashed significantly our charges.

“So, in all, returning students will be paying N140,000. In fact, some are now to pay N135,000 in total, that is those that are laboratory-based. Those that are not laboratory-based are paying less.

“It is important that the information gets out there because of some negative media reportage.

Commenting on the issue of electricity which has been unavailable in the school for the past three months, the Vice Chancellor said that the issue has been resolved and that electricity has now returned to the institution since last week.

He blamed the three months long power outage on the Jos Electricity Distribution Company, JEDC, who disconnected the institution from public source.

Professor Ishaya said, “the reason why we didn’t even struggle to make sure that the light was back was because the students were not around. So we now planned that by the time students are back, we need to make sure that light has been restored and light has been restored since last week.”

Meanwhile, this is coming at a time when the vice chancellor, Professor Ishaya is being antagonized by indigenes of the state over his emergence as VC.

Professor Ishaya is a Christian from Kebbi State. He was the former Deputy VC of the institution before he became its VC in 2022.

His possession of the office of the VC has given rise to protests by indigenes of Plateau State from various quarters challenging the appropriateness of the appointment.

While the VC struggles to navigate through his turbulent days as the most Senior staff of the institution, the welfare of students come to bear.

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