A case for more hostels at University of Maiduguri

Hostel accommodation has now become hot cake in University of Maiduguri. In fact, some students see it as a lucrative business, where they apply and secure accommodation at cheap rate and sell it to a third party at a very exorbitant rate.

The price of bed space in the school is between N15,000 and N22,000 officially, but some students sell the bed space at a high price of N35,000. Some even sell as high as N80,000.

This is being done despite the fact that it is against the rules of the school.

To make matters worse, there are reports that some people outside the school who are neither staff nor students, apply for hostel accommodation using students ID card and later sell same to students of the university at high rates.

This development has led to some students sleeping in mosques, churches, floors, lecture halls among others. It also leads to overcrowded rooms, which in turn leads to poor maintenance of the entire hostel.

University of Maiduguri is a very popular institution in the Northern part of Nigeria and has students from across the 36 states, the FCT and even foreigners.

In fact, the university has more than 30,000 students and more are still being admitted.

I appeal to relevant authorities to look into this issue and build more hostels in the school. Once this is done, students who consider this a business venture will no longer do so because there will be enough rooms to go round.

The government can also work with private developers on this issue as long as the rooms will be affordable.

Muhammad Yasir Garba Maiduguri, Borno State.