GEORGETOWN, Guyana (CMC) – University of Guyana (UG) students Monday staged a peaceful protest at the Turkeyen Campus against plans by the university to increase tuition fees by five per cent.

The UG is yet to issue a statement on the increase, but the students said they had been informed of the GUY$8,000 (One Guyana dollar =US$0.004 cents) hike in e-mails last week.

The students said that the increased fees come at a time when the UG has not improved facilities and complain of some classrooms being extremely hot.

There are still hot classrooms and poor toilet facilities. It’s absurd. What is the justification for increasing the tuition fees at this time? Why pay more for the same service we have been receiving,” one student told reporters.

The students say they intend to stage their protest action for the week

“Nothing is getting better and until things change we are refusing to pay the increase,” said one foreign student.

The protestors, mainly first- and second-year students, said their action was also to show their disappointment that the university had increased fees without any discussions with the student body.