By Naboth Isaac Niwagaba
A section of former guild leaders and students of Kabale Technical institute has joined the protest against alleged Maladministration at the Government aided school located in Kabale Municipality, southwestern Uganda.
The protest that started on 18th July 2022 involved students who marched out of the school to Kabale town streets in a demonstration against the hiking of school fees, abrupt end of academic terms, and alleged dictatorship.
Towards the end of the last academic term, students declined to attend classes as well as eat meals at the institute, which prompted the administration to alert Kabale police station to deploy at the campus in Rutooma village, Northern division.
While addressing the press yesterday, Kabale-based journalist Naboth Tukamushaba Teriyeitu who was the guild speaker between 2013-2014, and Pius Seguya the guild president of the same year, said that they could not look on as their former school is “going to dogs” under the poor management of individuals with selfish interests.
Tukamushaba and Seguya accuse the Principal Mr. Francis Tibemanya of witch-hunting the students and instructors on several occasions, citing the recent arrest of the current guild President who was later released on police bond.
They further noted that the frequent chaos resulting from unresolved conflicts dating back to a long period of time has affected the school enrollment of students and performance respectively. They said the school used to have up to 1000 students, but now the enrollment is only 310.
The former Kabale technical institute sports minister Patrick Tugume and Botha Akampurira who left the school in 2014 equally raised concern about the school administration and argued that the principal should be transferred in order to restore sanity and avoid the further decline of the school.
The former students have threatened to mobilize all the old students and forcibly evict the Principal from the school if the ministry of education and sports does not transfer him within two weeks.
When contacted, Francis Tibemanya the principal, accused his junior staff members of fueling the protests. He also accused some of the Staff members of going for further studies without his knowledge and falsely reporting him to District education officials.
By the time of filing this story, only about 20 out of 310 students had reported back to school from holiday, and sources say that the parents had supported their children staying at home, in protest against maladministration.
ISSUES RAISED BY THE STUDENTS
Edgar Byamukama, one of the students said that the last academic term was slated to end on August 12 in accordance with the timetable issued by the Ministry of Education and Sports, but the Principal issued a statement indicating that the term will close on July 22, 2022. Byamukama says that they were not given reasons for the premature end of the academic term, adding that it was not the first time such a decision was made.
Dan Ahumuza, another concerned student said that they were not happy with the administration’s decision to increase Information Technology (IT) fees from shilling 20,000 to100,000. He is also opposed to the amended policy compelling students with retakes to pay Shillings 530,000 for the whole term instead of Shillings 8,000 per paper as it used to be in the past.
Ahumuza said that the new policy also compelled students to register every year as opposed to the earlier practice where they would do it once. He said that they are required to pay Shillings 145,000 per registration.
Precious Kyomugisha, another concerned student pursuing a national certificate in plumbing, said that despite being required to pay Shillings 150,000 for tools, the administration had decided not to give them to students while doing industrial training. Kyomugisha said that they were stuck on what to use while going for industrial training.
Francis Tibemanya, the principal of Kabale Technical Institute dismissed the accusations leveled against him by the students as baseless.
