By Saasi Marvin Augustin
In December last year following strikes in November 2014 that paralysed business culminating into the closure of both Campuses, Nkumba and Ndejje Universities issued notices which were published in
The New Vision, requiring each day student whether or not they participated in the strike to pay a mandatory fine of over sh.200,000/= before being allowed back at Campus. According to the notice issued by Nkumba University through the Office of the University Council and signed by the University Council Chairperson,
Dr. Bwatike Matovu David, which set the date of re-opening of the University for day students as 19th January 2014, each must pay sh.150,000/= for replacement of the vandalised property as well as sh.50,000/= for the commitment form showing the student’s undertaking to abide by the Students’ Code of Conduct. No student who has not paid
the above fees will be re-admitted into the University on that date.
Similarly, Ndejje University in the notice issued by its Academic Registrar dictated that each day student had to part with sh.177,850/= for repairs and sh.50,000/= for re-admission before having reported back to the campus which re-opened on 5th January 2015. These notices where received with mixed reactions by a cross-section of the students at both campuses, with some denouncing the mandatory fines as shamelessly and wantonly unfair; some were apathetic, having resigned to the presumed fact that there is little they could do to avoid paying it while others suprisingly welcomed it.
As a result, some students were over-heard discussing the option of seeking redress from the courts of law, although most of them highly doubted the possibility of their suit succeeding. Questions, therefore, abound
about the legality of such a fine, especially in relation to those students who did not in any way participate in the strike.
A close look at the Constitution of Uganda, shows that it guarantees the Right to a Fair Hearing and this is encapsulated in Art. 28 (1) which says that every person is entitled to a fair hearing; Art. 28 (3) (a) which says that a person is innocent until proven guilty or until he pleads guilty and Art. 44 (c) which states that the right to
a fair hearing is inviolable. Furthermore, Art. 30 states that all persons have a right to education.
One of the affected students this reporter talked to at Nkumba University, an orphan who preferred anonymity, called the move by the University authorities to slap his guardians with such a heavy fine as being “replete with unfairness and utter disregard for the innocence of those students who did not take part in the strike.” Another
student expressed concerns that he may be compelled to ask for a dead year since its is now almost impossible to pay up all the fees in time for exams.
Just to be sure, this reporter approached one of the affected students at Ndejje University with the question of whether he had been invited by the University authorities to state his side of the story but the student replied that “If such an invitation has ever been given to me, then it must have happened only in my dreams. To be clear, I have never received any such invite, although I would gladly have gone to state my case had I been given the chance to.”
However, another student when asked for his opinion about the situating replied that he saw no problem with the Universities’ decision, since in his opinion even those students who did not directly take part in the strike atleast silently supported it in their hearts, for one reason or another and that therefore, they should be made to pay so as to
deter any similar unrest at the Universities in the future.
It therefore remains unclear whether the setting of such mandatory fees as a fine regardless of whether a student is culpable or not does not go against the spirit of Art. 28 (1) by not having granted some of the affected students a fair hearing, Art. 28 (3) (a) by presuming that everyone was guilty yet they had not been proved so, Art. 30 by threatening the students’ access to education and Art. 44 (c) by not adhering to the Art. 28.
The legality, let alone fairness of such decisions as was taken by the authorities at the two institutions therefore remains to be seen and there is little doubt that if such a decision were challenged in court, it would not only answer so many important questions concerning the validity of making it mandatory for every one to pay a fine irrespective of whether they are guilty or innocent but would as well serve to influence the means and conduct to which campus students resort whenever they are faced with unfair policies as well as guiding the response of the University authorities in the aftermath of a students’ strike.
