The Copperbelt University Student Union (COBUSU) today stormed the the Ministry of Education headquarters in Lusaka seeking Government intervention over the CBU management decision to bar squatting at the institution.
The Copperbelt University Vice Chancellor Professor Ngoma has with immediate effect banned students from squating. The Copperbelt University has an accommodation capacity of around 1800 bed spaces against the more than 13000 students enrolled at the University.
COBUSU president Oscar Mbewe said it was unreasonable for CBU management to bar squatting when the enrollment scale at the institution had kept on increasing and yet there had been no infrastructure expansion to allow the enrolment scales match with infrastructure.
“Right now, we have a population of about 13, 000 students at CBU against rooms with about 2,000 bed space meaning that 11, 000 students have no accommodation,” Mr Mbewe said.
Students are saying it defies reason for the CBU management to bar students from squatting at the institution when there was accommodation shortage.
Security guards are searching rooms throughout the day and night to ensure there is no squatting and this has lead to students sleeping outside.
Honestly do u need Govt intervation to be a squater?? Are these new PF policies? Youth u voted wisely indeed and u paying perfectly well, lets hope you vote unwisely for HH in 2016 maybe you will be well accomodated coz the man appreciated education, unlike those we cant call names here for fear of Vindictions…ask RB if u think am bluffing…
Iwe chi UPND carder, you sound insane.
This is rubbish my brother squatters do not pay full accomodation fees to the institution and you are there condeming you damn upnd cadre a party that will never rule.From your condemnation you never even went to school credibly
Why should they fight for squatting? The Universities in many civilised countries provide education services and students should fix their own accommodation! If the school says you are squatting in their property and you should leave then leave. It’s I’d not about crying for PF! Go and get a room outside campus and rent! If you can’t get out as school is expensive.
Where do you expect the poor students to get money for accommodation on top of the exorbitant tuition fees ??? Be reasonable people…just fix the situation by building more residential infrastructure for the varsity please !
As usual imposing bans without providing alternatives.
Monks, Momas, Bungewz, Lumpens and Mojoz thats a small issue. Noone can manage to stop u from ukusquata noku squatisha… Ninshi CBU naipwa nomba ayi??? Nabaice bene bafulisha pa university kwati nipa Basic school??? In our tym such a thng could not happen, not even a imbulube (kazizi) would be allowed to check our rooms. So fight it imwe baice!!!
which moderation is my comment waiting for?
Quite sad. Squatting is a student`s easy way of making money for beer and talk time to call that female student(Moma).I remember my college life in Zed.Us with rooms we even used to call ourselves landlords and our squatters the tenants whose responsibilities included cooking and sweeping the room.Ha ha ha…those were days.Please bane do something you know that you can`t accommodate everyone and rent on the private market is very expensive for most of the students.
Ah ah ah you have made my day ba former Landlord
Professor Ngoma certainly has TWO names. Whats the other?
Naison
Its a shame on the part of CBU management. How do you resolve a problem by creating another one? Did it not occur to them that there was a serious short fall in terms of accommodation at the time you enrolled these student ?Mr COBUSU president is the 13000 the number of students resident at the university or is it the total number of students at the institution including the non resident?
These COBUSU officials are misleading the public. The 13000 being quoted includes correspondent students and those doing part time programmes (evening). The full time students should be around 5000 to 6000! In any case, admission to University is not tied to accommodation and every one knows this. Unfortunately for public Universities people want free things even those that are capable of paying for their own private accommodation!
This is where people like Liato (the one who buried money), HH, GBM, Kabimba, Micheal, Mumembe, Milupi etc (and other local tycoons) can partner and build private apartments for rent, probably 5 or more storey buildings. This is not a problem but an opportunity. Please local business men, take advantage of this situation. People like GMB can easily move away from the transport business, and the habit of waiting for government contracts, to being real estate developers…
Uliwamano iwe. Viva local investment.
SENSIBLE SENSE
Those are gaps that investors can take advantage of actually! You are RIGHT! In Zambia we take to the streets and blame government; in actual fact that is a time to innovate ideas and means. Even those prefab container-based rooms would do just great!
students are careless that’s why theres lack of investment in places where there public institutions like cbu and unza. compare the boarding houses near these two institutions and compare the ones where students from private schools attract. not saying because their private but the prices are roughly the same.
that VC is a lunatic..where does he expect students to find money to rent boarding houses..?nonsense..let the students live how they want./.
I find it confusing with cbu management of Professor ngoma. For simple logic mr ngoma should be investigated for corruption with his boss. How can mr ngoma rent a 1 bedroom apartment when he has 13kids with a wife? Cbu management are getting katamulomo and create a first come first serve situation Every student pays for food, accommodation , textbooks and other administrative fees to which management must provide to students. They can’t squat if they don’t pay for accommodation and they can’t protest if the services which professor ngoma as received fee from students were reimbursed or not charged to the students whether they paid from their pockets or government . He be must investigated by ze president. why investigate mr Banda -mmd, yet ngoma pf- can’t be? We all are Zambians
Find accommodation outside the campus where kids can rent. And reduce tuition fees and accommodate kids. Illiteracy affect economy. Education must be cheap. Dr kk was smart than you guys. He gave you free education and bursary to makes sure that Zambia is not illiterate . You even crying foul for a simple academic qualification of becoming a republican president. Now you are settling for grade 12 cos you are not educated. Tell me if a professor can’t ran a university how can a grade 12 ran a country?
This is not PF but CBU management.Zambians wake up!!Everything stupid is 2 blame GOVT .The problem is the professor who can’t reason properly.Maybe he is sponsored by UPND/MMD to cause confusion.Otherwise we’ll sort him out soon with his UPND/MMD friends at CBU.PF govt is for the people of Zambia.We know that students need more hostels.
WTF??? You can’t stop squatting, what happens to a student coming from Livingstone and not accommodated…? I know the dull ones – like Professor Ngoma would say rent boarding houses, which they haven’t provided, and even if they are there provided by other individuals are not sufficient and certainly not safe, especially for the females. Furthermore, the playing field is not level for those staying on campus and those coming off it. This is the most foolish thing a professor can ever come up with, next to him deciding to put motor boards on graduands at point of calling their name during graduation.
Mwaitaya baba!!! Even there where you are in South Africa not all university students are accommodated by their institutions.
@stick, you are right. My niece was at University of Cape Town studying Architecture and she was living off campus and my daughter was living off campus when she was at University of Free State (Bloemfontein). Of course in both Cape Town and Bloemfonten there are many privately owned boarding houses for students and the appropriate officer in the Dean of Students Affairs Office liaises with the owners of such houses. CBU should work towards such an arrangement.
too much censoring of coments.zwd ni best.
Moderate this ..!.
Fcuknig Lusaka Times A R S E H O L E S….. After taking ages to type a message a clean message you go on to hold it in the name of moderating it.
imagine iyi!useles indeed.
cycle mata no 1 whatever your name is. Your thinking is pathetic if not useless. Don’t blame everything on govt. Analyse issues before you comment. CBU knows very well how many students the institution can accommodate at a particular time. It has nothing to do with how people voted in the last elections of 2011. It’s people like you with short memories and unresearched propaganda wanting to be noticed on public square when infact you a maggot with no basic political understanding. Keep your mediocre political understanding, to yourself than expose your foolishness in public for the sake of being heard. There is alot of respect in keeping quiet if one has nothing to say, than barking like a rabid dog. Don’t expect govt to remind you that your household food is finnished. Useless man…
With those insults coming we will continue moderating until you change your insulting behavior thanks.
Yes, a modicum of decency is necessary.
Yes, a modicum of decency is necessary, all round.
A big university like cbu has only got 2000 bed spaces. Do u expect a university in kitwe, the second largest city in zambia to only enrol 2000 students. The university is in the businessof providing university eduction and not in the businessof providing accomodation.a student can come even as far as ndola for all the university cares.you must travel to appreciate certain things.for the union to waste time and ask the university to provide accomodation to 13000 student is a hopeless view point that parades ignorance of the worst kind.in the near near future cbu will provide huge part time /online/distant program which will be more than the population of kitwe because that is the business of the university.not building
have you ever being to CBU ?
Its a pitty the students of today does not have the militancy and radicleness in approaching issues that directly affects them! Those days when we were super monks in the ruin dungeons, we used to sort out such trivial issues right there at monk square! Surely, is that an issue where the union leaders even go to ministry of education offices? Baiche imwe can you wake up and be counted, mwilanyafye amasushi ya beans pama level ati ninebo student! Wake up and use Jambo Drive!
Just sleep in misakuta on the university lawn
And the gov’t wants do build one university in each province yet two old ones are a handful for them to run… laughable indeed.
Haven’t they heard of free standing modular buildings that reach up to seven storeys in height specially constructed for student accommodation erected in months. Even better, greater storey heights can be achieved using lateral restraint from stair cores and form stability in larger buildings…engage us in the private sector if you want innovative solutions to your problems.
” ..engage us in the private sector if you want innovative solutions to your problems.”
Well who are you asking to engage you?? Supposedly Govt – yet you laugh at them with your first comment – i suppose you consider yourself very smart
So if company X offers constructive criticism they should be eliminated from the tender process; its this the selfsame outdated retrogressive warped mindset which keeps us undeveloped, in the west the gov’t would contact you first thing to wnat to hear your innovative views.
Wake up!!
this so called vc is nt logical in his thinking. I sw this coming last year jx wen he ws acting vc. I think he nids to see the bitr syd of students….guys jx go to jambo drive!!! Jx bcoz hs a soldier he wnts to bring army manners in a university. This is nonsense!! Some of us cudnt hv finishd uni if it wsnt for squantin noku squatisha…
You call yourself a university graduate and you can’t use proper English words on a public forum very scary!
Even a lot of you e-millionaires on this blog can go and be a solution to this problem. You talk of investments all the time. Put your money where your keyboard is.
Why make pronouncements when students are opening. The VC was supposed to give students notice well in advance. These students plan and they knew whom to share accommodation with. A well meaningful leader, to avoid such conflicts would have engaged the student union and discuss the matter. This could have given the management an overview of the situation in terms of
how many housing units offer accommodation to students;
what is the maximum distance covered by student to Uni
what is cost/students/unit,
what is the security and safety of students, etc
all is the responsibility of uni and VC.
Students are Govt trophy
“Leadership and Management crisis at its peak” Such mistakes can cost someone’s Job.
By way UNZA monks one time opted to sleep on top of those hostels, I…
This is what i meant when asking Mr Yaluma, why spend 7 million on one board member for doing nothing but cannot give accomodation to students. You will know me. I am not called Dora SC for nothing.
Ifyabupuba,were does this Barrack nigga expect us to get money to rent boarding houses?ena olo ali ku barrack ale squatisha and he expects us to stop squating,He doesnt understand us and he thinks he can bring militacy pa Zit.We will begin by first damaging his VEHICLE,ukuponona imbulube,then proceed ku JAMBO.Let him watch events unfold!!!!!!!!!!!
i think the idea of building boarding houses by the private sector is a good one. if they are far from the university one could even engage a tram to ferry students. but in all the bursaries should increase accomodation allowance to those outside the university
CBU is finished!!!
In our days such a trivial issue could easily be sorted out pa monk square. Ngafyashupa Jambo Drive was an easy way out. Surely monk police can easily handle that.
Viva ba monk dont be intimidated
Go and rent because you have more money in your pocket, you reap what you sow. Stop complaining this is what you voted for.
The worst part of cbu students is travelling to Lusaka overstepping the chancellor why? Only demagogues do such stupid things since this country is badly managed by pf despot or tinpot dictator.