Benue State University students shut down Makurdi to protest fees hike.

Students of the Benue State University, BSU, yesterday, crippled commercial activities in the state over the recent hike in tuition fees by the school management.

The enraged students barricaded the ever-busy Makurdi-Gboko federal highway, leaving travellers and road users stranded for hours.

The aggrieved students displayed placards with various inscriptions such as, “Reverse this unpopular decision”, “the new fee is anti people”, “our parents cannot afford this” and “we did not bargain for this.”

The protest, which lasted over four hours disrupted the free flow of traffic on the highway and also crippled all business and social activities within the neighborhood of the institution.

Speaking with newsmen, one of the protesters explained that management of the institution recently hiked acceptance fees for fresh students of the institution from N5,000 to N25,000, insisting that the increase was completely at variance with the current economic hardship in the country.

According to him:

“The increase is too much. How can any right thinking management raise fees at this time, considering the economic situation in the country? Our parents are civil servants who are being owed so many months salaries, yet school fees are being increased. It is wickedness.”