The Federal Education Ministry is seeking a bill to forbid tertiary institution from rejecting candidates duely qualified and merited admission through Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board ( JAMB)
It is to forestall a re-occurrence of past admission exercises in which thousands of qualified candidates were denied admission by federal and state higher institutions across the federation on the excuse of “no vacancy”.
In fact, going by the recommendations of the federal ministry of education to the proposed bill, an institution can only deny a candidate admission if he or she fails to meet with the minimum cut-off-marks , as well as the Post-UTME test.
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According to ministry sources, “the current practice whereby JAMB offers candidates admission to study a course of his or her choice and cannot be registrable by the institution, even after meeting the requisite qualification,does not augur well in the nation’s quest towards education advancement.”
The bill, the source said, would empower the National Universities Commission (NUC), National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) and National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE)-the regulatory authorities of the nation’s tertiary institutions-Universities, Polytechnics and Colleges of education- to with- hold budgetary allocation to erring institutions.
Besides, the governing council of affected institution to face disciplinary action.
But, in the case of state owned institutions, the three regulatory bodies are to forward recommendation to state ministries of education to implement appropriate disciplinary action (s).
BusinessDay further gathered that, the proposed bill is at the moment undergoing finishing touches for onward presentation to the National Assembly, when normalcy returns aftermath of the lockdown, due to the dreaded pandemic called COVID -19.
