JAMB uncovers fraudulent admissions in tertiary institution
…Sets deadline for institutions to disclose illegal admissions
…Insists on 16-year age limit for candidates
By Sodiq Adelakun
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, said it has uncovered a number of fraudulent practices through which tertiary institutions in the country are admitting students into their programmes, warning that it breaches the academic policy.
At a media parley on Sunday in Abuja, JAMB’s Public Affairs Advisor, Benjamin Fabian insisted that the minimum age for admission into tertiary institutions for the 2024/2025 session is 16 years as agreed by all stakeholders in the recent policy meeting hosted in the nation’s capital.
“For the 2024 admission cycle, candidates who will be at least sixteen years old at the time of admission will be considered eligible.
“This decision follows the directive from the Chairman of the 2024 tertiary admission policy meeting, who is also the Honourable Minister of Education, Prof. Tahir Mamman, that the extant policy of 6-3-3-4 be enforced only from the 2025 session,” he noted at the briefing session.
He revealed that there was an alarming avalanche of obviously false affidavits and an upsurge of doctored upward age adjustments on NIN slips being submitted to JAMB to upgrade recorded age.
According to the JAMB spokesman, this trend is dangerous, inimical and unnecessary, stressing that only those below 16 would not and should not be admitted in accordance with the decision of the 2024 Policy Meeting.
Fabian also warned that JAMB will no longer entertain absorption of illegal admissions through the window of “Condonement of Illegal Admissions without Registration number.”
He alleged that some institutions use this window to absorb, for the candidates’ sake, illegal admissions that were conducted prior to 2017.
His words: “It would be recalled that CAPS was introduced in 2017 to ensure accuracy, records, and transparency. accountability, fairness, and equity in admission into tertiary institutions in Nigeria. The window (for mop-up of pre-2017 unofficial/unregistered admission) has been on now for 7 years and it is now being abused.
“The Board’s position is informed by the discovery of widespread and unwholesome practice whereby some institutions were colluding with candidates to falsify vital details, such as backdated year of entry and subsequent age adjustments, to utilise certificates of genuine candidates with similar names to facilitate illegal admissions to enable participation of fake candidates in the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme.
“Recent worse discoveries made it imperative for the Board to speak out to save the integrity of the education system.
“In the same vein, the attention of the Board has also been drawn to the predilection of some institutions to admit candidates outside the approved Central Admissions Processing System, CAPS, platform and process such through the condonement of illegal admissions window to accord legitimacy.”
JAMB, however, insists that to close this abused window, the Board has decided that all institutions should now (or never) disclose all candidates illegally admitted prior to 2017 whose records are in their system within the next one month beginning from 1st August 2024.
Fabian maintained that any admission purportedly given prior to 2017 will no longer be recognised or condoned unless disclosed within this one-month window.
In addition, JAMB, has raised alarm over an upsurge in the number of doctored and upwardly adjusted age declarations on NIN slips being submitted by candidates.
The exam body expressed worry that the trend of underage candidates falsifying their age to gain admission into the university has become dangerous, inimical and unnecessary.
JAMB has now insisted that only candidates who will be at least sixteen years old at the time of admission will be considered eligible for admittance into the university.
He said the extant 6-3-3-4 on education will be enforced only from the 2025 academic session.
The statement partly read, “This position is informed by the discovery of widespread and unwholesome practice whereby some institutions collude with candidates to falsify vital details, such as backdated year of entry and subsequent age adjustments, to utilise certificates of genuine candidates with similar names to facilitate illegal admissions to enable participation of fake candidates in the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme.”
