Lilongwe University of Agriculture closes after students hold anti-fee hike demos

Natural Resources College campus a constituent college of the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR)  has been closed indefinitely, following anit-fee hike demonstrations.

The students all morning  had running battles with police as they  were staging protests against the fee hike by 45 per cent.

The protests started in the night until Thursday morning when police fired teargas to quell the students.

A letter from the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (Luanar) says the college has been closed indefinitely and all students must leave campus by 5 PM on Thursday.

LUANAR Vice Chancellor,  George Kanyama Phiri expressed surprise over the strike especially due the fact that the students did not follow the procedures.

Phiri  said this is why the Mmanagement has decided to close the campus describing the strike as illegal.

“I can confirm that we have temporarily closed NRC campus in order to protect lives and property,” said Professor Phiri.

Phiri said students went wild damaging property and beating up people.

“Some even went to as far as stealing chickens from the surrounding villages so this is not the good way of communicating to the management,” said Phiri.

But Luanar Students’ Union president, Peter Mbweza, denied that the protests were violent.

“The students were exercising their right to freely express themselves. The new fee hike will inconvenience us a lot,” he said.

Luanar  has increased tuition fees for all the undergraduate diploma and degree programmes offered by the university by an average of 45 percent.

According to the university, the new fees, hiked mostly from between K55 000 to K300 000 per year, are effective the 2016/2017 academic year.

achelor’s degree programmes generic students at Bunda Campus will now be required to pay K362 500 whereas bachelor’s degree mature entry students at the same Bunda Campus and those at City Campus will now be paying K771 000 per year.

The college has pegged the new tuition fees for “bachelor’s degree programmes at NRC Campus at K625 500 while bachelor’s degree programmes [ODL – Open Distance Learning] has been pegged at K300 000,” reads the statement.

It also says tuition fees for diploma programmes have also been hiked. Students at NRC Campus are now required to pay K367 749; those at City Campus will be paying K385 500 while those at Bunda Campus will be paying K362 500.

The fee hike protests in public universities started at the University of Malawi where authorities had hiked by K100000 until President Peter Mutharika ordered the slash of the fee hike by half bring peace to the University of Malawi campuses.

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