LASU's SCHOOL FEES REDUCTION: A 2015 APC Agenda
It is now visible that the rationale behind the outrageous increase of LASU's School fees cannot be substantiated. LASG in conjunction with APC Leaders have realised that they have only failed in the Mega city after they had inflicted much financial pains on helpless parents.
Towards the end of 2011, the parents were on their kneels pleading to the LASG (the so- called APC Leaders) to reduce the fees as many could not afford it. Quite a number of students were frustrated, some were kept behind bars, some were expelled, some were suspended and some even lost their admission.
The harsh conditions posed by LASG to all residents of LAGOS STATE has reached its peak. Those we believed were eminent Nigerians turned out to be the same people suggesting such obnoxious policy of a 725 percent increase to a 60 percent reduction. It is a pity that the state Governor, Babatunde Fashola who was a beneficiary of free education in UNIBEN, appended his signature to this outrageous fees, thus alienating the poor from having good education.
However, the state Governor and his predecessor have decided to turn LASU's fees to the act of selling and haggling over pepper as both administrations had a 725 and 100 percent increase in them respectively. The APC-led Administration can now realise that most of its votes could come from the students of LASU and their parents. Even the commercial motorcycle riders, bus drivers, market women won't vote APC in, as they have been able to manage the pain that it's administration had inflicted on them. It is understandable that the outrageous fees would be used for the 2015 election but as citizens of Nigeria and indigenes of Lagos State, we honestly promise to collect your money or gifts but we truly won't sell our votes to you. Even if you share I-phone 5s Gold Plated to all, we would only collect it to snap the next and most credible Governor Lagos state would have.
Nonetheless, the Lagos State Governor posed a rhetorical question in one of the interview's he had during the school fees saga: Shall we run our university for standards or sacrifice standards to churn out a generation of graduates without proper education? This is merely 'story for the gods'. It is good that you have been able to achieve your aim for a period of three years but we need to know the reason for the reversal of the fees. Do not try to convince us that there was no genuine reason to increase the fees in the first place.
Quoting the Honourable speaker of Lagos State and Commissioner of Information, Tertiary Education is not meant for a poor man's ward and all. It is pertinent to know that Quality Leadership Positions is not meant for all including touts, oppressive people and self-centered persons.
Despite the foregoing, it is good to appreciate the LASG for hiring those uniform men who oppressed students at the school gate. No Government is allowed to frustrate it's citizens. Suffice it to say that, "No bad product can rule twice".
In the light of the above, LASU SCHOOL FEES reduction is only seen as a 2015 APC Agenda. We look forward to seeing a new change in Government entirely and not the 'BABA SOPE', 'DICTATIVE GOONS', 'APC-Led Administration'. Thanks for suffocating public interest during your administration. Even if LASU's TUITION FEES is reduced to #25, who cares........? story for the gods...
At this cosmopolitan juncture, I rest my pen.
Lateefat Odunuga writes from Lagos State