ACCRA, Ghana (PANA)

Registration of freshmen at the University of Ghana in Accra Thursday took off under tight Police security as the National Union of Ghana Students continued to protest against new university fees they describe as "astronomical."

Some 200 policemen were deployed to assist university security guards to ensure a smooth running of the exercise.

Hundreds of freshmen queued at respective halls to pay their fees in full. Freshmen enrolling for undergraduate courses are to pay 300,000 cedis (about 120 US dollars), up from 50,000 cedis in 1998.

The students say the government should provide 13 billion cedis (about 5.1 million dollars) for the universities in 1999 while a definite way of funding tertiary education is found.

The government has announced a three-billion-cedi (about 1.1 million dollars) bursary for needy students but the students have rejected it.

Meanwhile, the Students Representative Council of the University of Ghana has threatened to take legal action against the Ghana police and the ministry of the interior for "brutality" meted out to students during Friday's demonstration against the new fees.

Nii Narku Dowuona, president of the council, told the Ghana News Agency that during the demonstration, many students were brutalised by people who claimed they were policemen although they did not have identification numbers.

He said the executive of the council has cause to believe that those people were not legitimate staff of the police and this calls for investigation to ascertain their identity.

Dowuona said the inspector-general of Police and the interior minister would have to explain why such brutalities should be meted out by security forces who were to have enhanced the "peaceful demonstration."

"Our (lawyers) are putting the charges in a legal perspective to be filed at an appropriate court at an appropriate time," he added.

The police Wednesday defended the action, saying though the demonstration started peacefully, at a point where the police insisted on confining the demonstrators to agreed routes, it became clear that some elements among the students were bent on violence and confrontation.

"They manifested this when they started burning tyres on the asphalt road constructed from tax-payers money," it noted. "This also constituted a fire hazard to the buildings and property around."

Touching on the controversial fees, Dowuona said the council is preparing "to protest vehemently" when all students are on campus later in the month.

He added that the council has no intention of disrupting the on-going registration process, "but when we report on campus, we shall see whether the academic calendar will be interrupted or not."