Students at Malawi University of Science and Technology (MUST) have accused management of making decisions in order to please the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) led government.
This follows a string of suspensions and a dismissal in the aftermath of a demonstration the students organised last year.
On 6 November 2016 students at the university boycotted classes and rioted demanding the administration to fix water problems at the school.
The protests led to a brief closure of the college.
According to a source privy to Malawi24, the demonstrations did not go well with the MUST administration because they always want to please DPP led government.
“The incident led to suspension of former students union president Chimwemwe Myaba, dismissal of the Secretary General Chimwemwe Semu and suspension of Patrick Kalombola, Arnold Banda and Majawa accusing them of fuelling the situation,” said the source.
Semu was initially suspended but after he appealed against the decision, the Vice Chancellor of the university Address Malata dismissed him without giving any reason.
The other suspended students also appealed but their punishments were maintained.
The source told Malawi24 that the decisions by the school were made during holiday to avoid conflict that would come from other students.
However, the affected students obtained court injunctions against their respective punishments and are now back at the university.
“However, to please government MUST pushes for the cases to go to court and held student body funds which they annually give the students so that they should fail to hire lawyers,” the source said.
Meanwhile, students at the university are planning to stage demonstrations demanding the administration to start handling matters intellectually.
“Right now there are looming demonstrations to force MUST management to do things intellectually and not pleasing politicians but rather follow laws,” said the source.
