Polytechnic clears air on fees, debunks arbitrary hike, imposition

Management of the Federal Polytechnic Nekede, FEDPOLYNEK, Owerri has dismissed as false and unfounded rumours making the rounds on social media that management of the institution has hiked prices for textbooks and other sundry fees stating that no unjust fees will be imposed on students.

The Rector, Engr. Michael Chidiebere Arimanwa who spoke to journalists in Owerri on the issue declared that the institution does not impose fees on students pointing out that everything done by his administration is in line with the rules and has justifiable reasons.

According to him, the N2,500 maximum cost of textbooks is the cheapest when compared with other schools in the South-East and South-South geopolitical zones even as many others do not have textbook price ceiling which means that students are at the mercy of lecturers who are at liberty to sell their books at prices determined by them.

Arimanwa who further stated that buying textbooks in the institution is not compulsory expressed surprise that people are protesting against the lowest price of a commodity at a time prices of goods are skyrocketing.

“Management does not arbitrarily impose fees on students. Whatever we do has a justifiable reason. Even with our increase in the price of textbooks in the institution, our maximum price of N2,500 is still the cheapest in the South-East and South-South when we checked.

“Some of the institutions do not have price ceiling for their books. Lecturers can sell at any price they choose. So we considered the students in fixing the price of books. Moreover, we said that it is not compulsory to buy any book written by a lecturer. Agitation about the price of something you don’t have to buy is misplaced. This is my first time seeing people angry about the lowest price regime of a commodity,” he said.

Commenting on the issue of O/level verification fee which the students insist management must scrap, the Rector explained the fee is charged by WAEC on the individual students whose credentials are to be verified and the examination body recently increased its charges by 100percent.

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His words, “O/Level verification is a WAEC fee. WAEC recently increased their verification fee by 100 percent. It is the owner of a certificate that pays for it to be verified. This verification is paid at the point of entry ND1 or HND1.

“At this point, students have a choice of changing to another institution if there is any institution where they admit students without verifying their results or where the institution pays for the verification without collecting the money from students. So, with the option of alternative institution, agitating, for this reason, is misplaced.”

The rector also spoke on the issue of payment for Quick Response, QR, and coding of certificates which the students are resisting and explained that introducing the codes on certificates and other sensitive documents such as Statements of Result and Transcripts was initially a decision of Management as something desirable to prevent the faking of the polytechnic’s results.

“NYSC in early 2021 sent us the results of 4 fake corps members who had Statements of Result not issued by our Registry. That was when Management decided to include QR codes as part of our Statements of Results, Certificates and Transcripts. Over time, we received it as a directive from NBTE who also received it as a directive from the Federal Government. So, the introduction of QR code on sensitive documents moved from what we want to do to what we have to do,” he added.

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