Final-year boarding students of Nandom Midwifery Training School in the Upper West Region are accusing the principal of charging each student a feeding fee of GH₵1,000 per semester even though they have been away from the school for one month for a mandatory midwifery practice.

Since GH₵1,000 covers the full semester of four months, the students argued that paying the full amount and eating on campus for three months instead of the four months amounts to daylight robbery.
They are, therefore, demanding that the cost of food for the one month that they were out of campus on mandatory midwifery practice should be slashed from the feeding fee.
In a video circulating on social media, the students were seen and heard in front of the principal’s office chanting “we won’t go”, No reduction, no payments” until the police were called in to calm down the situation.
“Paying the entire amount for feeding for a semester without being fed for a month is an injustice and we seek justice from our principal.  We are ready to pay for the number of days we are to stay on campus,” one of the final-year students said.
Following this protest and other issues raised by the students, the principal of the school, Miss Barbara Nabia Sagbil, confirmed to The Finder that she cancelled lectures for final-year students because they had refused to pay the GH₵1,000 feeding fee.
“When students do not pay monies owed the school, they are unable to log into the system to register. Once students fail to register, lectures cannot take place,” she revealed.
While admitting that the students were on mandatory midwifery practice for one month, she insisted that the students must pay the full amount of GH₵1,000 as feeding fee to remain as boarders or be stripped of their boarding status and become day students.
According to Miss Sagbil, she has no authority to reduce or increase the feeding fee even though the students didn’t stay on campus for a month.
Even though it’s the school that uses the money to purchase food to feed the students, she cannot reduce it because it is an approved fee from the Ministry of Health (MoH).
She claimed that if she reduces the amount, she would have issues with auditors from the Ministry of Health.
On other issues, the students also accused the principal of issuing threats of dismissal of students and transfer of staff who tried to question her actions.
The principal has disconnected all sockets in the various rooms of second-year students – and they are compelled to charge their phones and laptops outside, and the students have complained that this is not safe because some students have lost their phones to theft.
The students are not happy about the disconnection exercise because they have paid utility bills but are being denied access to electricity to charge their phones and laptops.
The Upper West Region happens to be one of the regions which record the highest number of cerebrospinal meningitis (CSM) cases each year.
This condition comes as a result of warm weather condition and inadequate ventilation in rooms.
In view of this, the final-year students have disclosed that the only two fans in their hostel are inadequate and disconnecting the sockets which they can use to power their standing fans could “endangers” their lives.
The students also explained that they are forced to sleep in the open during the warm season, which puts their lives at risk since the school is not fenced and is located on the outskirts of the town.
The students called for an urgent redress of these grievances by the Regional Health Director.
The principal of the school, Miss Sagbil, told The Finder that the decision to disconnect all sockets in the hostel was necessitated by the students’ inability to refrain from using unauthorised gadgets.
“They are only allowed to use electric irons, computers and phones. They sometimes bring to school unapproved gadgets, use them illegally and mostly leave it unattended to and this could cause a fire outbreak. Where the students live does not belong to the school. There is not enough space to accommodate the entire students in the school and so we are renting elsewhere for the rest of the students. We would not want to cause any damage to the property due to negligence,” she disclosed.
Miss Sagbil added that the rules of the institution do not encourage rioting.
“The school is to report to the police when there is rioting. The school is to also give a 10-day mandatory suspension or a termination of the students admission when found guilty,” she said.
As at the time of filling this report, the police had restored calm on the school campus.

Source: Thefinderonline.com