KAMPALA:Several parts of Makerere University and its environs were drowned in teargas for most parts of Monday morning as police and the military battled some Makerere University students who were demonstrating over the university’s insistence on conducting online lectures.
Within the university premises, especially around Nsibirwa Hall, some students, who were donning red gowns, carried placards as they demanded the administration to start face to face lectures, saying the online ones are expensive in terms of data and not inclusive, especially for those with disabilities.
Some of them getting chatting People Power movement slogans and singing songs composed by Robert Kyagulanyi.
“The President has fully opened the economy but the university is sending us to go and study online. We have gone above two semesters without seeing our marks yet they cannot allow you to graduate when you have missing marks,” Mathias Ocaya, a student of Social Work and Social Administration, said
Makerere University Guild President Shamim Nambassa said: “In a situation where the whole economy has been opened, we are wondering why Makerere remains closed. There is no valid reason as to why the university should remain closed yet we are paying lots on money as tuition and functional fees and we have to incur charges to buy data.”
But their gathering that was slowly building was immediately dispersed by police and the military and some students arrested.
But the strikers then moved to the university surroundings such as Kikoni and Kikumi-Kikumi where they burnt tyres and lit fires in the middle of the roads.
But police quickly put out the fires and arrested more students.
The Kampala Metropolitan Police deputy spokesperson, Mr Luke Owoyesigyire, said 10 students were arrested and are currently detained at Wandegeya and Makerere University police stations.
Mr Owoyesigyire will remain deployed in and around the university to see that the situation does not go out of hand.
Meanwhile, Makerere University Vice Chancellor, Prof Barnabas Nawangwe, said they will soon resume face to face lectures but most likely in the coming semester.
“We are working out a road map for possible full opening of the university for face to face teaching and learning in the shortest possible time, hopefully by the second semester. In order to achieve this, we have made arrangements to vaccinate all students against Covid-19. Currently, only 20 percent of the students are vaccinated,” he said.
Prof Nawangwe noted that blended teaching and learning was approved by the university in 2015 under the distance and e-learning policy as the most appropriate mode of teaching and learning in in the modern higher education.