The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rolle@tribunemedia.net

COLLEGE of the Bahamas students are calling for improved security at their Oakes Field campus after two of their women students were assaulted in the past week on or around the campus.

Alphonso Major, president of COBUS, the college’s student union, attacked COB officials for not doing enough to address students’ security concerns when he spoke to The Tribune yesterday.

He added that the women seemed to be the most targeted group in crimes around the campus.

While declining to name the victims of the recent attacks, he said: “A young lady was in a restroom last week Thursday when two men came in and held her up using a screw driver. While they were robbing her, a girl came in the restroom and they pushed that girl on the floor and ran out.”

In the second incident, which took place late Monday, he said a student “was sitting and studying” at a popular site just outside the school’s main campus, near its book-store, when “someone came behind and hit her in her head.” “She put up a fight with the individual,” he said, but “was left on the ground after the incident.”

The COBUS president could not say what items were taken from the students, but noted that robberies of students are relatively common on campus.

“Last semester we had about ten car break-ins,” he said. “We had a student robbed as she was walking from her sociology class; they took her iPad, jewellery and phone. Another young lady last semester was held at gun point; they took her visible items.”

The COBUS president said he attended a meeting with school officials on Monday to address the crime situation. But the result of the meeting, he said, was unsatisfactory, with the Director of Security at COB merely suggesting to him that the solution to the security problems at the school is for students to start wearing their IDs.

Mr Major said the crime problem at COB exists, not because of the failings of students, but because of the lack of manpower among security personnel. “There’s been a total of 15 to 20 security officers let go in the last two years. Right now we have 14 full-time security officers.”

In addition to securing the school’s main Oakes Field campus, he said the 14 guards work shifts and have to secure the school’s Grosvenor Close Campus on Shirley Street, which is home to the college’s School of Nursing and Allied Health Professions as well as the residential campus for students living in dorms, among other areas.

“The guards,” he said, “could have been terminated due to sexual harassment, a person not doing his or her job or other issues, but the point is if you let go of these people, you have to replace them. The student population is rising and so are the number of criminal incidents. It’s not the time to be losing security guards.”

“It’s important,” he said, “for the Minister of National Security to take a keen interest in the security of the leading academic institution in the country, especially since this is in his constituency. Don’t neglect COB.”