Tension gripped Yola, Adamawa State, on Monday, April 28, as students of Adamawa State Polytechnic staged a protest over a prolonged power and water outage on campus.
What began as a peaceful demonstration within the school premises soon spilled onto the streets, with students chanting “we want electricity” and demanding urgent intervention from both the school’s management and government authorities.
The demonstration, however, took a tense turn when a scuffle broke out between some of the protesting students and passersby, prompting security operatives to step in and restore calm.
Some students, speaking during the protest, described the hardship caused by the situation. One of them said:
“This is the third time this has happened in three months; we have suffered enough staying in the school without light and water. The light supplies water, we struggle to even cook food, and yet we still attend lectures. This is unfair to us.”
Another student added:
“I can’t cope without light due to my health condition and the hotness of the weather in Yola is something else. The school administration is not helping us, we have spoken to them but they refused to take action and that is the reason why we decided to protest.”
A third student also lamented:
“We need urgent action to be taken and we plead with the government to help us, because as students, we find it very hard to navigate through our studies without light and water. These two are very essential in life.”
Police officers from the Adamawa State Command arrived at the scene to de-escalate the protest. They reportedly engaged with the students, urging them to maintain peace and avoid further disruptions. However, when some protesters refused to disperse, the officers fired warning shots into the air to scatter the crowd and prevent the situation from worsening.
In response to the incident, the management of Adamawa State Polytechnic announced the immediate closure of the school for one week, effective Monday, April 28.
According to a statement from the institution’s authorities, the temporary shutdown was necessary to enable them to begin the process of restoring electricity to the campus. Students were instructed to vacate hostels and school premises without delay.
