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Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has urged the
authorities of the University of Ibadan and Adekunle Ajasin University to
“immediately reverse the patently illegal increases in fees, as the fees
would stigmatize students that may be unable to pay, lead to a filtering
out of such students and foreclose any realistic possibility that they
will contribute in even the smallest way to the progress of our country.”
The organization said: “The universities ought to have carefully
considered the effects of high fees on accessibility and the vision of
education that they seek to achieve. The universities are advised to find
solutions to their funding difficulties elsewhere. But if they fail to
reverse these fees within 7 days of the publication of this statement,
SERAP would take appropriate legal action to compel them to do so.”
While the University of Ibadan increased fees for students’ professional
training and accommodation, Adekunle Ajasin University increased school
fees. The professional fees range from N75,000 to N100,000 per student,
while accommodation fee in the hostel was raised from around N14,000 to
N40,000 per student. AAUA increased school fees from about N35,000 to as
high as between N120,000 and N200,000 per session.
Reacting, SERAP in a statement today by its deputy director Timothy
Adewale said: “The dramatic increases would have the effect of
discriminating against disadvantaged students who may be unable to pay the
new fees, and who are not granted any exemption, thereby creating a
classification based on the economic and social status of their parents.
The increases would also undermine the students’ rights to education and
equal protection guarantees.”
According to the organization: “The inability of the students or their
parents to pay these fees would result in an absolute deprivation of a
meaningful opportunity for the students to enjoy educational benefit.
Increasing fees because the authorities are not adequately funding the two
institutions is victimising the students over an issue they have neither
control nor responsibility.”
The statement read in part: “Students that are unable to pay these fees
may become disillusioned, gradually disassociate from the universities,
and eventually drop out entirely. When a student is excluded from gaining
the full benefits available in public school because of inability to pay
fees, the effect is exclusion which naturally imposes a lifetime hardship
on a discrete class of students not accountable for their disabling
status.”
“SERAP also urges the leadership of the National Assembly to come up with
legislation that would: end arbitrary imposition of fees in our public
schools; grant exemptions to students from disadvantaged background;
ensure that our universities are adequately funded on an equitable basis
to ensure the proper exercise of the rights to equal protection of law and
education and redress inequalities in education provision.”
“The right to education is too important to be left to the budgetary
circumstances of individual university or socio-economic status of parents
and families. Any perceived financial hardship faced by the UI and AAUA
cannot justify the violations of the students’ constitutional guarantees
of equal protection and Nigeria’s international obligations to ensure
equal access to the right to education. The right to education is not a
commodity for sale.”
“Nigeria cannot continue to compete and prosper in the global arena when
university students are chased away because they cannot afford to pay
fees. And if Nigeria cannot compete, it cannot lead. If our students
continue to face victimisation, discrimination and exclusion on the
grounds of their socio-economic status, Nigeria will become a nation of
limited human potential. It would be tragic if the authorities at UI and
AAUA and the government of President Muhammadu Buhari allow this to
happen.”
“While the increases in fees may be financially necessary, they are
illegal, as they amount to victimisation and discrimination of students
from disadvantaged sectors of the population, contrary to the provisions
of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the International
Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights both of which Nigeria has
ratified.”
“SERAP notes that section 12 of the University of Ibadan Act prohibits
discrimination on grounds such as social and economic status. It provides
that ‘no person shall be subjected to any disadvantage in relation to the
University’.”
“The increases also violate the right of the students to equal protection
of the law, as guaranteed by sections 17, 18 and 42 of the Nigerian
Constitution of 1999 (as amended). Equal access to education is a human
right and necessary for the enjoyment of other human rights. It is the
very foundation of good citizenship. The opportunity of an education,
where the state has undertaken to provide it, is a right which must be
made available to all on equal terms, regardless of ability of parents to
pay.”
“No students from disadvantaged sectors of the country have the means to
change or control the financial status of their parents. Therefore, any
denial of an educational opportunity to such students based on their
inability to pay a fee would be grossly unfair and unconstitutional.”
“Education provides the basic tools by which individuals might lead
economically productive lives to the benefit of all. The UI and AAUA
cannot ignore the significant social costs that would be borne by our
country when disadvantaged students are denied the means to absorb the
values and skills upon which Nigeria’s social order rests.”