The Inquirer (Monrovia)
Janjay F. Campbell
9 April 2008
Monrovia — The students of Kendeja High School yesterday staged a protest action expressing their dissatisfaction over the government's failure to make available a building that would be used to host them for classes.
The students numbering over 200 set up roadblocks, thereby impeding the mobility of pedestrians and motorists from using the Monrovia Robertsfield Highway.
According to our reporter who was on the scene, the student action was precipitated by the failure of the government to make available a building that could host them for classes after they were relocated from the school's main site located at the Kedaja Cultural Center.
Some of the students, who spoke to our reporter, expressed dissatisfaction over the building that was provided them as a temporary site. They told our reporter that the building was too small to host all of them and that there are no toilet facilities, chairs, benches water among others at the new site, thus making learning condition quite unfavorable.
Our reporter said that the students' action later turned into violence when they refused to compromise their adamant stance with the police in spite of all the persuasions by the police.
Our reporter said when the students refused to abandon their action, the police apparently surmising that the students' action has caused problems for many motorists and that their action could possibly degenerate into further problems, began to fire tear gas to disperse the protesting students.
The action of the police was vehemently resisted by the aggrieved students who responded by throwing stones at the police.
Our reporter stated that during the pandemonium, one senior police officer was severely hit by a stone thereby leading to the arrest of three students and were then whisked to the Central Police Station on Capitol Hill.
The Vice Principal of the school for Students Affairs, who identified himself only as Mr. Cheyard, told reporters that the Minister of Information, Lawrence Bropleh had assured them that the school's new site would have been ready for academic activities after the break.
He added that to their utmost surprise, Minister Bropleh continued to give what he called, "mixed information" relative to the temporary site of the building, which most of the students said is not conducive for learning.
For his part, Mr. Garman K. Carter, an instructor of the school alleged that some amount of money, was given to the Ministry of Information by the R.J. Industry to build a new school building for the students.
He said the students were told to attend classes yesterday, but to their greatest surprise the place was not ready as the minister had promised.
During the student protest action, they held an Assistant Minister, Mr. Quiah, hostage and damaged his vehicle. He had reportedly gone to the protest site to calm the situation.
However, the tense situation was later brought under control by the Liberian National Police and UNMIL.
Information Minister Lawrence Bropleh could not be reached up to press time as his phone was continuously switched off.
Recently, the Kendaja High School, which is the only public school in the area located at the cultural center, was relocated after the government resolved to give it to an American-based group for the construction of a four star hotel.
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