D-Day for UPNG students

TODAY is D-Day for University of Papua New Guinea (UPNG) students.
They have been warned by the university management to return to classes by today or face the cancellation of semester one and possibly the rest of their academic year.
While the student leaders and hardliners are determined to continue their boycott of classes, which began two weeks ago, other students face a real dilemma about their future at the country’s premier state university.
In the absence of a referendum, it is unclear what percentage of the student population at UPNG support the continuation of the boycott.
The Student Representative Council (SRC) is convinced that it has the support of the majority of students and is standing firm on its demands to the O’Neill Government.
Nonetheless, the reasons for the students’ action remain vague and it doesn’t help matters when the SRC continues to be tight-lipped about its list of demands after president Kenneth Rapa refused to present their petition to Higher Education Minister Malakai Tabar during the first week of the boycott.
Rapa and his SRC executives were adamant that they would only present their petition to Prime Minister Peter O’Neill and not his envoy.
A disappointed Tabar later issued a media statement warning students that their semester one examinations were only three weeks away and the deadline for withdrawal from studies had lapsed.
“This means that those students who consciously choose to boycott classes will fail the courses for which they have enrolled.
“Failing four to five courses automatically amounts to exclusion for more than two semesters,” Tabar said.
Since then the UPNG academic senate decided that if the boycott of classes continued, the 2016 academic year would shut down by last Friday.
That decision has been amended and students have until today to return to classes or feel the wrath of the UPNG management.
Vice chancellor and senate chairman Prof Albert Mellam said in a circular to staff that if students’ absence from class lasted more than two weeks then their continuation in their enrolled programmes would become untenable after last Friday.
The UPNG management said in a media statement last week that it had made every attempt to resolve the current student impasses and urged students to return to classes.
“Acting on the resolutions of the university senate, the minister’s request for students to resume classes, the UPNG management has requested the student body to work collaboratively with them to bring normalcy to the university so that all students can resume classes and prepare for the impending examinations, which are scheduled to commence on May 30, 2016.”
It would be in the best interest of the student body for the SRC to put their grievances aside and agree to end the boycott and resume classes today.
Whilst the students’ actions over the past two weeks have drawn a mixed reaction throughout the country, their decision today to continue with the boycott will certainly not be supported by their parents, sponsors and other stakeholders.
Several national leaders have joined Minister Tabar in calling for common sense to prevail at the UPNG, as well as the University of Technology in Lae and the University of Natural Resources & Environment in East New Britain.
Among them are the two champions of free education – Prime Minister O’Neill and Enga Governor Sir Peter Ipatas – who reminded the students that they were privileged to be receiving university education subsided by the national and provincial governments.
As O’Neill said in a special message to UPNG students last week, “Students you are the privileged few, you have the intellectual capacity and are leaders of tomorrow. Do not sacrifice your education and disrespect your parents who invested so much for you.
“Like my mother did, they too have sacrificed their well-being to send you to get educated.
“I ask every student to go back to classes. You education is priority. Do not risk it.”
We couldn’t agree more with the Prime Minister and urge the students to return to classes today.
Whatever grudges the students have against the O’Neill Government, now is not the time to express them.
They will get that opportunity during the 2017 general elections, which are only 13 months away.