The Rent Commissioner, Frederick Opoku, has described conditions in some private student accommodation facilities as “appalling” and “shocking”, following inspections triggered by a petition from the National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS).

According to him, the inspections revealed overcrowded rooms, poor ventilation and facilities that, in his view, do not meet the basic description of a hostel.

Mr Opoku said he decided to inspect the facilities after receiving the petition to establish whether the concerns raised by NUGS reflected the actual conditions on the ground.

He said he approached the exercise without taking sides, describing himself as “more or less like a referee”.

“So when I received the petition, I advised myself to move to the ground and see if what the complaint they gave me was a reflection of what is happening,” he said on Joy News’ PM Express on Wednesday.

But what he found during the inspections left him deeply concerned about the conditions in which students are living.

“Evans, your guess may be as good as mine. When I just started the viewing on the grounds, it was shocking, honestly, and I was wondering what the issue was,” he said.

Mr Opoku said ventilation was among the major problems identified during the inspections.

“And you realise that the conditions and ventilation in the rooms were a challenge,” he said.

The Rent Commissioner also questioned whether some of the facilities had been properly licensed or adequately monitored.

“And I was wondering, were they even licensed at all? Are they monitored at all, and what have you because I was a bit scandalised to see young people in rooms/cubicles,” he said.

He was particularly critical of the practice of accommodating several students in small, thinly divided spaces.

“I don’t think it’s what you talk about when you are referring to hostels. These are cubicles, not hostels,” he said.

Mr Opoku said some rooms housed as many as six students, while others had three or four occupants.

“Thinly dividing room, four in a room, three in a room, six in a room, like prison,” he said.

He said the problem was not isolated to a single institution, claiming that similar conditions were found during inspections at several universities.

“So I went around to all the universities almost, and the issue was the same,” he said.

The Rent Commissioner believes the conditions of student accommodation require urgent attention, particularly given the number of young people living in such facilities.

“So, what I can say is that the state of our children, our young people in this school, in these campuses that they call hostels, is something that needs to be looked at again,” he said.

He described the situation in stark terms and said government could not allow such conditions to continue under the cover of private investment.

“Because Evans, it’s appalling, shocking, it’s a killer, and we cannot, as a government, sit down for such behaviours to be perpetrated under the guise of private investors,” he said.

“For me, Evans, it’s a shame, and that we must relook at it again,” he added.