Students gather inside the Polytechnic Lafia after facilities were torched during a protest over increase in late registration fee.
By Collins Sunday
The Isa Mustapha Agwai I Polytechnic Lafia has been shutdown for one week following a protest by students of the institution.
Students burnt down the gate house and destroyed other facilities in the school during the protest.
Firefighters trying to put off fire set on the main gate building at Nasarawa State Polytechnic by students during a protest.
Rector of the polytechnic, Dr. Justina Kotso made the disclosure on Thursday in Lafia, the state capital while briefing newsmen on the steps the management is taking to forestall further breakdown of law and order within the school premises.
Dr Kotso said that in order to ascertain the reason for the protest, a committee has been set up to investigate the remote and immediate cause and report to the management for onward action.
READ : 61,000 doses Of COVID-19 vaccine to be administered to Nasarawa residents
“We woke up this morning calmly preparing our students for semester examination scheduled for Monday March 15, then suddenly we realised that the students started a protest.
“They started throwing stones, breaking classes and carrying placards.
“When they came to the administrative block, we had a meeting with the students union government, but did not know why they started destroying items,” the Rector added.
The Dune on a fact-finding mission to the institution gathered that the reason for the protest was due to the closure of the registration portal and increased late registration fee from N5000 to N10,000.
One of the students who pleaded anonymity explained that the school registration portal has been having issues for some weeks thereby hindering students from been captured in the school data base.
“In the ICT department, there used to be many staff working there but now only one man is left to attend to all students who come to make payment of school fees. The students are always there under the scorching sun from morning till evening. The situation has been unbearable for many students so we are appealing to the management of the institution to do something about it”
But the Rector has denied the allegation by the students that the management closed down the registration portal and increased late registration from N5,000 to N10,000.
She explained that the registration portal is open and the management did not increase any fee, saying that about 162 students made payment of school fees even on the day of the protest before they went on rampage.
The Dune reports that during the protest, the students destroyed part of the institution’s administrative block, street lights, water tank, vehicles, and the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Centre, among others.
