Students call on Sir Mekere and Parkop to assist Waigani campus

MORE than 2,600 registered students at the University of Papua New Guinea have called on Sir Mekere Morauta, and Powes Parkop to allocate counter-part funding to the university to enhance its welfare.  
Sir Mekere is the member for the Port Moresby Northwest and Parkop is Governor of the National Capital District. 
The appeal was made by the students through their school representative council president Bill Minjikul.
“Both leaders should chip in their counterpart funding to the university because it comes within the jurisdiction of their electorates,” Minjikul said.
“They have a collective role to play for the betterment of the university.”
Minjikul said the national government funded only K39.5 million to the university this year but it actually needed K71 million for both its project development and operational costs.
He said government’s contribution was far below what was needed for the operational cost of the university.
The final year environmental science student said given the situation each financial year, the university had never implemented projects like building extra halls of residence for its increasing number of students.
The university management admitted this in its recent dispute with its employees from the National Academic Staff Association members.
The staff association lodged their petition that their Nasfund contributions were not paid on time for the past four years because the university faced cash-flow constraints in the latter part of each financial year.