Uganda: Striking students should pay costs

In May, the management of Gulu University suspended, for three weeks, more than 1,000 students from the Faculty of Education and Humanities over a strike that resulted in the burning down of the university’s main hall.

The students – mostly in their first and second academic years – had been angered by the delay of release of their previous semester exams; yet another set of exams awaited them just a week away.

Gulu University Vice Chancellor, Prof Jack Nyeko Pen-Mogi, condemned the students’ actions, saying they shouldn’t have directed their anger on a building; sending a heap of decades-long history into ashes.

Yesterday, this newspaper reported that a total of 279 Education students missed their final exams over failure to pay a fine of Shs200,000 slapped against them as punishment for torching the building two months ago.

What does this mean? The university spokesperson, Ms Amelia Kiggundu, said those that had missed the exams would retake the papers upon paying the fine and those that do not pay would not sit the exams when the academic year comes full circle.

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Likewise, the administration of Lango College in Lira District imposed a fine of Shs52,000 per student when on June 15, students burnt down the school pick-up truck and vandalised school property over poor feeding.

Whereas the students are right in demanding fair and right treatment, the choice to burn down and vandalise property is unacceptable. And their choices have consequences.

Nabumali High School in eastern Uganda is still struggling to regain its feet after students on October 11, 2004 set the school ablaze, burning the administration block staff quarters, library and the dining hall, purportedly over lack of water. The decision, therefore, to fine the students and stick to their guns by turning away defaulters from exam rooms – brutal as it is – is the right tool in stemming off a likely repeat of that kind of strike.

The call now goes to the doorsteps of other institutions of learning. For instance, whereas students of Makerere University are clever enough not to destroy property on campus during strikes; they throw away all aspects of modesty as soon as they hit the nearby suburbs of Kikoni.

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Makerere and other institutions should pick a leaf from Gulu University by liaising with authorities of nearby suburbs and value property destroyed during such strikes and pass the costs to students.

The law allows peaceful demonstrations, but when they become violent, it should not become business as usual. You cannot have your cake and eat it!

The issue: Cost of strikes

Our view: Makerere and other institutions should pick a leaf from Gulu University by liaising with authorities of nearby suburbs and value property destroyed during such strikes and pass the costs to students.