Some continuing students of Ghana’s premier university, University of Ghana, who are residents in Mensah Sarbah and Commonwealth Halls, have threatened to resist any attempt by the management of the university to nullify their residential status.
This comes after the school’s management, on December 13, issued a communique announcing that all male continuing students of the Commonwealth Hall and Mensah Sarbah Hall will not return to their halls nor to any of the traditional halls, instead, they will be assigned to available rooms in any of the UGEL and private hostels.
According to the students, this is a move by management to start an In-out-out-out policy as part of measures to handle accommodation problems on campus.
“Mensah Sarbah Hall and Commonwealth Hall have always been pivotal since time immemorial when it comes to advocating for the welfare of students. The two halls have on countless occasions stood by students, fought good causes to the benefits of students and resisted obnoxious policies from both government and management against students; we are not stopping this anytime soon we assure you.”
Vandals And Vikings
The students disclosed that apart from the high cost of UGEL and other private hostels which they cannot afford, they also suspect the move is an attempt to break the activism power house of the student front, weaken the alumni allegiance and affiliation of students to these halls upon completion of their studies.
Instead of the In-out-out-out policy, the students, want the management of the university to build more hostels to accommodate the increasing number of students and not adopt an ‘unthinking’ approach to solving accommodation issues.
Incompetence and Mismanagement
According to the students, they find themselves victims of incompetence and mismanagement, as they are made to take a bitter pill of absorbing the monetary cost of the actions and inactions of management of the university.
“The University Management maliciously brought out this information a week to the beginning of Christmas and expect parents and students to find money to pay for an accommodation at a place which now costs over GH¢3,800 as compared to the about GH¢1,000 they would have paid in their original halls. Why burden parents and innocent students this way?”
Vandals And Vikings
The students further disclosed that, somewhere in 2020, after about 10years of operating the Diaspora Halls now UGEL hostels, they, as students, did their part by paying the high hostel fees slapped on them as the management of the university failed on their part to service the loan contracted to build the hall project, which has resulted in the privatization of halls and also a takeover of some annexes of other halls to be used as collateral.
“The other traditional hall annexes which have now been privatized, again due to incompetence of University Management, also slaps different hostel fees on students higher than the students in different annexes of the same hall.
“Why should students continue to suffer the consequence of the incompetence of senior officers, while these senior officers remain at post?”
Vandals and Vikings
The students also indicated that the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission has issued a directive that all public universities should effect a 15% only increment across board for fees charged in the 2021/2022 academic year, but the University of Ghana, the students noted, has clearly not heeded to the directive despite the commission issuing another release stating that all institutions that do not follow this directive will be sanctioned.
“Nonetheless, we say to the University of Ghana Management today that, we will remain resolute and will not kowtow to such knee-jerk reactionary approach.”
Vandals and Vikings
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