USAG threatens to picket at parliament over school fees increment

The University Students Association of Ghana (USAG) has threatened to hit the streets if their calls for the reduction of academic fees are not heeded to by relevant authorities.

According to the Association, they have scheduled to meet with Vice-Chancellors Ghana and the National Commission for Civic Education over the matter and are hoping for a favourable outcome.

He added that they are scheduling to meet with the Minister of Education and the Minister in Charge of Tertiary Education over their request.

Speaking to UniversNews, Press and Information Secretary of the Union, Kwadwo Murdock, reiterated the increment in fees was insensitive as it comes at the time when finances have been impacted due to the outbreak of the coronavirus disease.

Kwadwo Murdock said that if stakeholders do not agree with them on the need to reduce tertiary fees for the 2020/2021 academic year, they would picket parliament.

“We are also in talks with Vice Chancellors Ghana. We are also scheduling a meeting with the NCCE. We are hoping that the school fees issue will be resolved as early as possible. But then if we realize that they take an antagonist position, I think we will mobilize the students to hit the parliament premises making sure we demonstrate with parliamentarians that we are not okay with the proposed fees and under such, they should not approve it…what we are doing is that we are scheduling a meeting with the Minister of Education and the Minister of State in charge of Tertiary Education to make sure that we extensively have deliberation and we are hoping that it will remain there and we will be able to rectify the issue,” he said.

Parliamentary approval

According to the Fees and Charges Act 983, any proposal to increase fees will first have to be approved by parliament. As it stands, it is unclear if the observed increment has been given the go-ahead by parliament.

Prior to this, tuition fees were increased for the 2019/2020 academic year by 5 percent. This was later assented to by parliament.

The University of Ghana is one of the few schools to have increased fees for the next academic year.

Ghana Institute of Journalism, earlier this month increased fees by 5 percent for the 2020/2021 academic year.

Meanwhile, the University for Development Studies has reduced academic fees by 16%