Candidates of the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) are being extorted by some private secondary schools, according to the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede.
Oloyede made the claim on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme on Monday.
Oloyede expressed concern about the alarming practice of schools charging exorbitant fees—up to N10,000 or N20,000—for registration, significantly exceeding the actual JAMB fee of N6,000–N7,000.
“What we are calling on the candidates to do is that they should go to the centre and register. But one very important thing that we are facing now with students, either with disabilities or without disabilities, is that UTME is not a school-based examination,” Oloyede said.
“There are private secondary schools who are extorting the candidates; they will take 10,000, 20,000 and they say JAMB forms, whereas they pay just 6,000 or 7,000, as the case may be. They are mismanaging the data of the candidates.”
He also claimed that these private schools mismanage candidate data, as each candidate is required to register individually using his or her phone.
“Every candidate is supposed to register with his or her own phone but these people are mixing their data together.”
Oloyede added that UTME is not a school-based exam and that individual registration is mandatory, noting that even requests for special group registration, like one from Federal Government College Bwari for students with disabilities, were denied due to the Board’s individual candidate policy.
“Even one institution, Federal Government College Bwari wrote to us, ‘Can you give them (people with disabilities) special registration?’ It is not possible, we are not school-based. We register individual candidates who are going into the university, we are not registering cohorts.”
The JAMB registrar also explained that the main reason behind the creation of centres for PWDs was to provide equal opportunity for all candidates writing the UTME.
He said JAMB identified the need for special attention for people with disabilities and decided to create the centres with the help of some individuals and organisations.
“The idea is that those who are suffering from physical disabilities require support. We find out that they need special attention and this special attention cannot be easily available in 774 centres across the country.
“So, what we therefore did was to create centres that are as close as possible to where they are coming from. We know that that is even a strain on them but in order to provide equal opportunity for them, what we have also done is to provide wherewithal for them and their guide to the centre and we created this centres across the country so that the closer they are to the place of abode of these candidates the better,” Oloyede said.
Oloyede confirmed that the 2024 UTME registration began last week and will close within the next four weeks.
