Negotiation to reduce fees on going

Accra, Aug. 12, GNA - Ms Elizabeth Ohene, Minister of State in charge of Tertiary Education, on Tuesday said negotiations are still going on about the fees to be paid by the University students this academic year.

She said things are getting difficult because the university authorities have already presented their budget and they have to go by it, hence the need for negotiations.

Ms Ohene, who was speaking to the Ghana News Agency in an interview, said for the fees to be reduced to the level the students are demanding there need to be a lot of changes in the curricula of the institutions.

"A course that should take two years for completion, would have to take three years so that the fees to be paid in two years, would be stretched over the three years period, a computer laboratory to be built in six month would have to be built in a year" she said.

In recent times the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS) has strongly protested against the fees the universities are demanding. The students are demanding that the government should use part of Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund) to subsidize their fees. Mr Nathaniel Kwaw, Secretary of NUGS, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, said even though, there should be cost sharing, the average Ghanaian parent was already overburden and could not pay the more than six million cedis being demanded as fees for one child.