Bulmun Sunday Dakwal BARKIN LADI—The walls look old and faded with black stains. The painted metal bars attached to some parts of the hostel walls are rusty. Windows are broken, ceilings are leaking, and the toilets are in a bad state, oozing odour. A square-shaped space with an open rooftop serves as the female students’ bathroom. This is the state of the hostels at Plateau State Polytechnic, Barkin Ladi Local Government Area.
In 2021, the Plateau State government approved ₦20 million for the renovation of hostels in the polytechnic. This aimed to create a safer and more conducive environment for the students. In 2022, the project was recaptured in the state budget with an allocation of ₦18 million, and it was to be monitored by the state’s Ministry of Higher Education.
While Block B a male hostel, was recently renovated through the Federal Ministry of Education, Abuja, Block A, another male hostel and C, a female hostel, are in a sorry state.
Established in 1978, the institution currently has two male hostels and a female hostel just a few meters away.
When this reporter visited the hostels – Blocks A and C – it observed that not only are the students contending with the unhygienic toilets and their environment, but they also have to deal with the hostel’s lack of bunks.
UDEME observed that not all rooms in Block A had bunks; some rooms had just two bunks, some had just one, and others had none, forcing these students to lay their mattresses on the bare floor.
A Higher National Diploma (HND 2) student, Joseph Plangnan, told UDEME how she had to endure a 30-minute drive, coming from her family home in Buruku, Jos South Local Government Area in her first year in the Polytechnic before she could secure a decent accommodation off campus.
“The hostel wasn’t conducive enough for me, I had to start coming from home in my first year before I could secure a good accommodation for myself off campus,” she said
For students who cannot afford the off-campus housing like Abigail Amos, who stays in Block C, the situation is a daily struggle
“The standard is honestly discouraging. We keep having issues of toilet infection, we have to clean the toilets ourselves, and it can be challenging because not everyone is willing to clean. I just had to stay here because I cannot afford to pay for accommodation outside the school,” Ms Amos added.
Most of the students expressed their dissatisfaction with the condition of the hostel
Philip Golpwana, a 100-level student in the hostel (Block A) and his roommate told UDEME how they have been battling with a room filled with water whenever it rains for the past two weeks.
“Whenever rain falls you will see the whole of this place will be filled with water because water comes in through the window, for the past two weeks that’s what we have been battling with,” Mr Golpwana explained
Samuel Gideon, another student at Barkin Ladi Polytechnic who resides off-campus, shared his reasons for choosing to live outside of the school’s premises with UDEME:
“Left to me there is no good story to tell about that hostel, I stay off campus because of the way the hostel is, the rooms do not look nice, the toilets are not in good condition, I see how some of the male students who stay in the hostel go to the bush sometimes to defecate,” he said
The toilets in these hostels looked very dirty and oozed with a bad odour such that one could barely stand in for over two minutes. Some parts of the bathroom walls have cracks and big holes from behind which can serve as easy access for reptiles such as snakes into the hostel.
The unsanitary conditions have led to concerns about the spread of diseases.
A medical professional, who works at the Federal Medical Center, Bida, Niger state, Dr Esson Tsaku, spoke on the importance of having a hygienic school environment. “The fact that a lot of people have access to a limited number of restrooms is already a problem and the level of good hygiene shouldn’t be compromised” Dr Tsaku said.
An interventional radiologist at Tranquil and Quest Medicals, Lekki, Lagos state, Dr Joshua Udenyi, further spoke on the health threat that women are likely to experience as a result of an unhygienic toilet environment
He said “Women are generally expected to have basic sanitary needs like a clean toilet or a bathroom, a poor hygienic toilet will not provide these needs which can affect their health. In such situations, we find females presenting urinary tract infection as the most common infection females have from a very unhygienic environment.”
He also went further to state that an unhygienic environment could cause illnesses such as cholera, and typhoid and also serve as a breeding ground for mosquitoes which is a causative factor of malaria.
Efforts from the Students Union Government
The Student Union Governor, Alex Dayak in an interview with UDEME stated how they as a body have put in effort and still working to see that the other two hostels are renovated, to create a clean and conducive environment for the students
“We have reached out to the former school management while they were in office several times through our letters and had meetings with them to see that the hostels are properly renovated because honestly, the hostels are looking very, very, bad.”
“Efforts are still ongoing, we have written letters to the new management twice but nothing has been done but now we have requested a meeting schedule with the management.” He added
Govt: Paucity of Funds?
On May 27, 2024, UDEME submitted a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the Plateau State Ministry of Higher Education to seek details concerning the recently renovated Block B and the state of the other hostels.
The Commissioner for Higher Education, Dr. Kachollom Pyam noted in a response that the renovation of Block B was entirely funded by the NEEDS Assessment Intervention for Public Polytechnics in Nigeria, a federal programme administered by the Ministry of Education in Abuja.
The response noted that Block B remains locked and inaccessible because of the non-availability of beds in the rooms.
“The renovation [of the other hostels] will commence whenever funds are available,” Dr Pyam said.
This story was produced and funded by UDEME, a social accountability initiative of the Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development (CJID)
