‘ Spilled-over’ students to pay half
Following the controversies which have trailed the announcement of an increase in school fees, the authorities of the University of Jos on Thursday approved instalmental payment and a further reduction.
UNIJOS announced that two per cent of the amount payable by all students would be dedicated to assisting indigent students, with 50 per cent being channeled towards providing scholarships for indigent students and the other 50 per cent to be utilized for the expansion of its work-study programme, a development that was said to have elicited the admiration of students, parents and staff.
The announcement came a few days after its Vice Chancellor, Prof. Tanko Ishaya had told The PUNCH that the institution had crashed school fees.
According to him, the decision to reduce the fees followed a series of negotiations between UNIJOS authorities, students and other stakeholders.
The students had blocked roads leading to the campus in protest, following an increase in school fees and other services rendered by the institution.
The student protesters in a recorded video were mobilized by leaders of the Students Union Government of UNIJOS.
While calling for an urgent reversal of the hike in school fees and other services rendered by the institution, the students had 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.
UNIJOS fees have been crashed from whatever 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.
Two of the student leaders, the President and one nominee of the Hall Governors would serve as members of the Hostels Maintenance Committee that had been set up.
While students having spilled over with one semester are to pay only 50 per cent of the reviewed charges, UNIJOS also extended the deadline for the registration exercise by two weeks to October 8, 2023.