THE SCHOOL FEES PAYMENT SAGA
By: Abdulrahman Yahaya
The school management and the students’ representatives held an emergency meeting on the 5th day of February 2018, and your number one press board on campus the News Digest Press UDUS, was there to cover the meeting as it happened live at the VC complex.
The crux of the matter in the meeting was the issue of lateness in paying school fees by some students. Obviously, these students pay school fees lately for reasons best known to them.
The Vice Chancellor, professor Abdullahi Abdul Zuru, revealed that 50 percent of students are yet to pay their fees for the previous session, and lots more are yet to pay for the current session. This, obviously, has become a nagging headache for the school management.
When it comes to late payments of school fees, the first sets of students that come to mind are state sponsored students of Sokoto and Kebbi States. Most students of this varsity are from this state. They had both decided to pay school fees for all students, who are their indigenes. This, one can say is a laudable step in supporting education, but it has become a nagging headache for the school management, as both states have gained notoriety in lateness in payment of school fees. We feel, if these states had decided to pay for their indigenes, then they should endeavor to pay in time or on time in order to avoid this this type of quagmire.
For some students, late payment of school fees is unavoidable, there are students who are schooling and at the same time hustling to pay their fees. In this fold, we have students who are orphans, and those whose parents are even struggling to feed themselves at home, let alone paying school fees. We are not justifying lateness in payment, but rather bringing to the notice of the school management, that only very few students deliberately refuse to pay in time, most of them have convincing excuses and circumstances that make them pay school fees lately.
The recently committee set up by the school management to collect remitta receipt from students, came as a bombshell to many students who have not paid, it has thrown some into panicking, for if strictly followed, the process will screen out many from writing the forthcoming examination.
We plead on behalf of these students, that the school management should come up with a more lenient approach to solve the issue.