Michael Okpara Varsity Shut as Students Protest Fee Hike

Emmanuel Ugwu-Nwogo in Umuahia

The Michael Okpara University of Agriculture Umudike (MOUAU) was yesterday  shut down indefinitely by school management following a violent protest by students over hike in school fees.

The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Maduebibisi Ofo Iwe, said in a statement he personally signed  that the school management took the drastic action in order “to safeguard lives and properties on campus.”

It was gathered that students, who were prevented from writing the ongoing first semester examination for failing to pay their school fees, mobilised and embarked on protest march against management.

But the MOUAU  VC blamed “miscreants and hoodlums” for the protest, saying that the university community “woke up to experience the violation of the long-existing peace of the university.”

He said that he was attacked “by miscreants who took over the university”, damaged his official vehicle and those of other officials.

According to him, the protesters were  “claiming that they were not allowed  to take their first semester examination owing to their failure to pay their charges.”

He said: “The university records show that 70 per cent of the students had paid charges and were peacefully taking their examination, while more than 2,000 were in the queue to pay and register their courses before the miscreants and hoodlums took the stage to cause trouble and disrupted the long-standing peace of the university.”

In the course of the protest the aggrieved students were said to have stormed the examination halls and disrupted the exercise by chasing out their colleagues participating in the examination.

Chanting solidarity and anti-management songs, the protesters marched through the institution, went outside the premises and blocked the Umuahia-Ikot Ekpene federal road thereby disrupting inter-state movement of vehicles and travelers.

They displayed placards with inscriptions expressing their anger and demand. Some of the inscriptions read: “VC Iwe, reverse our school fees”, “Say no to extortion”, “Allow us to write our examinations.’’

The protesting students also smashed glass windows and other properties at the Senate Building, Secretariat of the Students Union Government (SUG), library, MOUAU Microfinance Bank, main gate, among others.

As the protest heated up, ancillary business activities around the university abruptly ended as shop owners shut down for fear of mob attacks and looting.

However, the situation was eventually brought under control as the police arrived and started firing tear gas canisters as well as gunshots into the air to disperse the disperse the protesters.

Speaking with journalists, some of the students, expressed their disappointment at the MOUAU management for “brazen act of insensitivity in this harsh economic situation in the country.”

They specifically blamed the VC for the protest, alleging that he had gone into the examination halls and chased out students who were yet to pay their fees.

One of the students said that school fees were increased twice last year hence those hitherto paying about N50,000 now have to pay between N120,000 and N150,000, depending on course of study.

“We started our first semester examination yesterday (Monday) and the vice chancellor came to the hall and sent out those who have not paid their schools fees.

“They increased our schools fees twice in 2023. Some of us were paying about N50, 000, but it is now between N120, 000 and N150, 000.

“The vice chancellor insisted that students must pay it at once, even when we begged them to allow us pay in two installments for the two semesters,’’ one of the aggrieved students lamented.

There were also some students who claimed to have paid their fees but were not allowed to write the examination because “our names were yet to appear after doing our biometrics.”