UNIVERSITY of Fiji students staged a protest at the Saweni campus in Lautoka yesterday to highlight grievances with administrators and executives.
The student body and faculty are at loggerheads over issues surrounding the state of school facilities, including furniture and computers, at the university’s two campuses in Lautoka and Suva.
The crisis resulted in students rallying at the university’s Saweni campus yesterday, calling for a resolution soon.
Student association president Ratu Sailosi Dawai said he sought answers from school management with regards to issues raised by the student body.
He claims promises had been made to address their concerns over the years, however, none of them have been fulfilled to date.
He said they had provided an appeal to senior administrators earlier this week in an effort to sort things out.
Ratu Sailosi said students were seeking intervention from Government or the Fiji Higher Education Commission.
“We’ve had negotiations with some of the administrative officers, including the acting vice-chancellor, and we’ve had pocket meetings with the registrar and the executive director finance,” Ratu Sailosi said.
“Some of the issues that fall within their jurisdiction have been resolved but we have not heard anything from the bigger authority, the University of Fiji council. We do not know what level of assurance they can give us that this time things will change.”
Yesterday also marked the last day of the Black Ribbon Movement. University acting vice-chancellor Professor Narendra Reddy said the students wrote to the management on Monday regarding their grievances.
“They gave us only three days to respond and we cannot respond to a number of these issues immediately within a three-day period,” he said.
One of the major issues raised by the students has been the state of IT labs at the campus.
Prof Reddy said they ordered new computers for the lab.
“We met yesterday to receive the tenders and by next week we’ll be able to offer the successful tender for installation of the 90 personal computers.”
When asked why issues had taken long to be addressed, Prof Reddy said there had been changes in management over the years.
