Protesting OAU students paralyse varsity activities

Students of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State are currently protesting the hike in their school fee.

Our correspondent gathered that the protesting students have locked down major buildings in the institution.
It was learnt that principal officers of the university are presently locked up in the senate building.
“We have locked everywhere including the senate building, computer building and we are presently blocking the school gate. We are ready for the school management, we don’t care whatever happens to them there. The VC too is around, we want them to also feel what we are going through,” one of the protesters said.
OAU recently increased the fees of its newly admitted students from N37,150 and N42,150 to N 82,400, N92,700 and N95,700 (acceptance fee inclusive), depending on faculties.
The fees of old students of the institution was also increased from N5,300, N7,800, N10, 300 and N12,800 per session to N19,700, N30,700 and N33,700 for different faculties respectively.
Among the locked places are: senate building, computer building and the main entrance gate that leads to the university campus.
Our correspondent also gathered that Muslims among the students turned the main road to a praying ground.
“We have instructed the Muslims among us not to go for prayers. They prayed on the main road here. We already supplied them with water for their ablution,” one of the protesters, Akin added.
It will be recalled that the students had previously blocked the Abuja-Ife expressway at several occasions. In one of their protests, they were shot by a soldier attached to a presidential convoy.
However, the Vice-Chancellor of the university, Prof. Bamitale Omole, had in a press conference blamed inflation and sustenance of the institutions standard for the increment.
He also explained that the university had not got the ASUU/FG fund, which the students said should be used to provide relief.
He also stated that Special Relief Committee has been set up to attend to indigent but brilliant students, adding the increment was “inevitable”.
The students, however, said they were not ready to negotiate with the school management any longer, arguing that previous negotiations failed.