UNIMED VC Justifies Tuition Increment, Says Paucity Of Fund Threatens Institution’s Survival

The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Medical Sciences (UNIMED) Ondo State, Prof Adesegun Fatusi, has maintained that there is no going back on the hike in tuition fees of the institution, saying except the institution is allowed to increase school fees, it may soon collapse due to poor funding.

Fatusi who stated this during a meeting with parents, students, and stakeholders following the recent increment of the school fees, said the steps taken by the school became imperative in order to properly train students in medical fields.

According to him, the step was not taken to place an unnecessary burden on parents and students of the school but to avoid imminent collapse of the school if the underfunding of the school persists.

The VC said he cannot explain the rationale behind the establishment of a specialised university without a single purpose-built structure with no take-off funds beats imagination.Fatusi who took time to give the breakdown of the institution’s challenges since inception in 2014 as well as its running cost, stated that with the increment, UNIMED still charges the lowest fee among state-owned universities of medical sciences in the country.

He said “Several times, I have struggled to understand what was going on in the mind of the initiators of this great dream when they conceptualized it with apparently no considerable thought about its infrastructural needs nor its financial sustainability.

“Our fee for the current students is only 10 to 15 percent increase and that is due to a number of factors and situation trends. This is a specialised school where only very few students are permitted to be trained for each course.

“For example, it’s only 10 students for dentistry. So, when people compare prices, they cannot be comparing it with big universities that are all conventional universities that will have up to 100 to 200 students.“With the nature of the university, it is capital intensive in terms of equipment which are dollar-denominated.

There is no way we can collect the same money we are collecting in the past with the dollar now at over N500 and the inflation rate at the level it is.“Even for the new school fees, in at least 11 courses, the school fees are still under N200,000. It is only about three or four courses that the fee had gone up.

If you even compare it to the other state universities of medical sciences in this country, our fee is still considerably cheaper.

“In addition, we have given 50 percent discount to the indigenes of Ondo State. That is significant, no other state university has done that. With the way we are, we need a generous fund increase in the university to make things work.Parents need to do their part, government, we hope will be able to help us and community members too. We have all agreed that this school cannot move forward without increased funding.”

While lamenting over the infrastructural deficit of the institution, Fatusi disclosed that private buildings and estates had to be rented to serve as classrooms and to ensure that members of staff have offices.Speaking, the Osemawe of Ondo kingdom, Oba Victor Kiladejo who was represented by the Lisa of the kingdom, High Chief, Simeon Oguntimehin assured that the community will swing into action in order to make the university succeed.

The Students’ Union leader of the school, Rashed Oloyede appealed to the state government and the school management to reverse the school fees schedule according to the year of admission.“We don’t want to see some of us dropping out because of the increment of the school fees our parents can not afford.

“We appreciate the University for their efforts on the students and we also understand the subvention the University is collecting from the government which might be the cause of the increment, but we should know that the issue of our parent’s salaries presently can be the limitation for them to pay our school fees.

“We don’t want this school to collapse because we don’t have anybody to run to except the governor and the school management. We plead to the governor through his representative in this meeting that the state government should please focus on the university for sustainability and development.”