LASU students protest higher school fees

Traffic was disrupted for several hours on the Lagos-Badagry Expressway on Thursday as students of Lagos State University (LASU) barricaded the road in protest against the recent increase in fees by the institution.

The placard-carrying students called on the state government to reverse the increase to avert a breakdown of law and order at the university.

Addressing the students, the student union president, Akeem Durojaiye, said that the protest would continue until the university rescinded the decision.

"We will continue to disrupt academic activities at LASU. We will soon take the protest to the Governor's Office in Alausa to drive home our demands," he said.

Timothy Ikenna, a 200-level Mass Communication student, accused the state government of "contradiction by claiming progressive credentials but treating students with disdain."

"Governor Fashola, who said he will bring education to the doorstep of the common man at his second-term inauguration, ought not to take such a policy decision.

"To ask the least student in the school to pay a fee of ₦193,000, under the present economic condition, is not bringing education to the common man,'' he said.

Celestine Okocha, a 200-level Political Science student, said that the new fee regime was not in the interest of the suffering masses.

"Clearly, the new fee regime is oppressive and it is as if the state government wants to prove Karl Max right," he said.

Mr Okocha said that a government that was not properly implementing its own minimum wage policy did not have the justification to demand parents pay huge amounts for their wards' education.

Olatuju Azeez, public relations officer of the students' union, said at the scene of the demonstration, that the increase was unacceptable to them. He said that the students were ready to sustain the demonstration until the government and the university authorities heeded their demands.

"Since management will have us act unruly by asking us to pay an outrageous fee, we will therefore convert the school into a place where frivolous things are engaged in," he said.

The students converted the international expressway to a playground for games such as soccer, dancing competition and posing for photographs.

The Divisional Police Office in Ojo, M.A Yusuf, a superintendent of police, said that his men had restored the peace to the area.

He appealed to the students to allow motorists to use the road undisturbed, adding that " no car or public property was destroyed."