Cape Coast, Oct 30, GNA - Rev Prof Emmanuel Adow Obeng, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast, has said the university had put more than five billion cedis into an endowment fund it set up about four months ago.

He told journalists that the latest contributors, AngloGold Ashanti Limited, donated 30,000 US dollars and that the university will honour individuals and organisations that would contribute towards the fund.

Other contributors are ECOBANK 50 million cedis, Goldfields 100 million cedis and Norton Rose and Taysec Construction Limited 100,000 dollars each.

He called for assistance from all well meaning Ghanaians and business entities to contribute to the fund, which among others would be used to improve teaching and research in the University. The Vice Chancellor expressed concern over the substandard accommodation some individuals in and around the university are renting out to students at a very high cost.

He said most of the rooms lack the basic and requisite facilities like toilet, bathrooms, electricity and pipe-borne water. Prof Obeng said efforts, through the Students' Representative Council, to the landlords to reduce the rents and also provide the necessary facilities had gone unheeded.

He added his voice to SRC's continuous appeals to those involved to stop the over-exploitation of students and ensure that the basic facilities are provided for them to live comfortably while they study. Prof Obeng said people were encroaching on the university's lands and that the university is being squeezed and cannot expand. He said efforts to eject the encroachers had proved futile even after a court order. The encroachers prevented a bulldozer from demolishing the structures.

Prof Obeng appealed to the government to assist the UCC to eject the encroachers.