Two stakeholders in the nation’s education sector have disagreed on the discriminatory fees charged by state-owned tertiary institutions across the
country.
This issue has, no doubt, compounded the myriad of problems in the sector, ranging from poor funding, lack of educational infrastructural facilities, Mystery still surrounds death of 3 siblings in Imo incessant strikes by lecturers as well as the resultant long closure of the institutions, which usually alter the academic calendar.
While many of the state universities charge students, who are indigenes, less tuition fee, non-indigenes pay higher, inspite of the fact they get the same level of services from their lecturers.
At the Plateau State Polytechnic, while indigenes pay N50,000 tuition per session, non-indigenes are charged N100, 000 for the same period.
Authorities of the Moshood Abiola Polytechnic, Ojere, Abeokuta, Ogun State, charge indigene N57,000 but students from other states pay N62,000 as tuition fee per session. Some students of MAPOLY even pay as much as N75,000, depending on the specific fee charged by the various departments.
An indigenous student in Kwara State Polytechnic pays N28,000, while the non-indigene pays N44,000 per academic session.
At the Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomosho, Osun State, an indigene pays N65,000, and non-indigene (N72,500).
An indigenous student at the Polytechnic, Ibadan, Oyo State, pays N45,000, while his colleagues from other states pay N50,000 per session.
At the Imo State Polytechnic, while an indigenous student offering an Ordinary National Diploma course pays N30,000, his non-indigenous colleague is charged N40,000. For a Higher National Diploma course, while a non-indigene pays N65,000, an indigene is charged N22,000 per session for the same programme.
An indigene attending the Oyo State College of Agriculture pays N47,250 tuition, while his non-indigenous colleague pays N52,250 per session.
While N100,000 is paid as tuition fee by an indigenous student at the Ondo State University of Technology , Okitipupa, non-indigenes pay N150,000.
This discriminatory payment of fee in state-owned higher institutions has compelled many parents to prevail on their children to choose Federal universities as their institutions of first choice, though admissions in the federal institutions are more competitive.
But some state-owned institutions have somehow been able to eliminate this discriminatory practice. Both indigenous and non-indigenous students pay the same amount as tuition fees.
In Osun state University, for instance, all categories of students pay N95,000 each per academic session as tuition fee.
Similarly, at the Enugu State University of Technology, every student pays N124,900, regardless of their class levels and each of them is also required to pay the sum of N10,500 for late registration.
Each student at the Cross River State University of Technology, Calabar, pays N83,000 as tuition fee for a session, just like their colleagues at the Abia State University , Uturu. At ABSU, each student pays N150,000 tuition fee per session.
To stakeholders, however, fee discrimination is an anomaly, which has become a norm entrenched in our educational system. They also view it as a threat to the Federal character policy enshrined in the Nigerian constitution, which sets out to prevent tribal or regional domination of any government or its agency.
A human rights activist and the Convener, Conference of Nigerian Civil Rights Activists, Ifeanyi Odili, described the development as being discriminatory and an abuse on the citizens’ rights “because it is entrenched in the country’s constitution that if a citizen stays or resides in a particular state for 10 years or more, the person automatically becomes a citizen of that state.”
He added that the long-standing practice of differences in tuition fees payable by students would not foster the true spirit of brotherhood and nationhood.
Odili further argued that it countered the objective of the National Youth Service Corps created by the Federal Government to develop common ties among Nigerian youths and promote national unity and integration.
The President of the National Association of Nigerian Students, Mr. Chinonso Obazi, said that the issue of difference in tuition fees paid by students of the same institution could be regarded as a sabotage of the nation’s education system.
Obazi said that a situation where non-indigenes in an educational institution owned by a state were being charged discriminatory and higher tuition fees was no longer
acceptable.
He added that rather than giving preferential treatment to indigenous students in an institution, state governments should focus on indigent students, who have had excellent academic performance.
However, the Chairman of the UNILAG Consult Management Board, Prof. Taiwo Osipitan, SAN, argued that there was nothing wrong in state-owned higher educational institutions charging discriminatory tuition fees.
Osipitan said that the differences in the tuition fees paid by indigenous and non-indigenous students in state-owned higher institutions had nothing to do with the principle of true Federalism.
