''Fees Rise by 40 per cent As Schools Resume''

By Abel Abel Inis
Correspondent, SAM Daily Times

As pupils and students nationwide conclude their long holidays this month, parents have, once again, been burdened with another increase in school fees. Most people are worried that the government is doing nothing to check this ugly trend. Investigations by Leadership Sunday have shown an astronomical increase in the amount being charged by schools as fees.

The inability of government to provide well-equipped public schools for its citizenry has provided private schools the opportunity to exploit Nigerians by the exorbitant prices they charge as fees. Some of these increases are effectively carried out without parents actually realising it. Some schools increased their boarding house fees, while others without boarding facilities only increased the daily lesson and extra lesson, leaving the main school fees as it were.

Investigations conducted in several schools across the country saw schools giving upward reviews of up to 50 per cent to their boarding houses. Proprietors have attributed the increase to: upgrade of facilities like buildings, laboratories, and manpower; and also to the hike in fine, registration charges and taxation on private schools by the government. Parents and guardians are far from happy with the situation and some have said that they may be forced to withdraw their children/wards from schools if the fees charged are not reduced.