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…as UNILAG’s post-UTME seen marred by AI glitches
In an era where digital platforms have become central to education delivery, Nigerian students are increasingly bearing the brunt of persistent technological failures.
From unstable e-learning portals to sudden system crashes during critical assessments, these glitches have caused more than just academic delays, they are contributing to rising levels of anxiety, stress, and emotional exhaustion among students.
As tech-dependence grows without matching infrastructural support, the mental toll is becoming too significant to ignore.
Recently, the University of Lagos (UNILAG) found itself under intense public censure as a result of widespread glitches in its post-UTME screening examinations for the 2025/2026 academic session.
Similar complaints trailed the post-UTME exercises of Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) and the University of Ibadan (UI).
One of the affected candidate shared his ordeal, lamenting how his 350 score in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) conducted by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) is being turned worthless as his post-UTME was flagged by UNILAG’s artificial intelligence detection system for alleged cheating.
Some months ago, a post graduate student of UNILAG told BusinessDay how his scheduled computer-based test (CBT) for his FSS examination almost frustrated him.
“I was scheduled to sit my exam between 9:00 am and 12 noon. For more than an hour I was waiting for the streaming of the questions, all to no avail. I had to board a cab in front of the Moremi Hall to the SPGS centre to lay my complain to the management, but return, all they could say was ‘go and continue to wait, it will stream’.
“In frustration, I had to settle one of the boys operating a business centre within the Faculty of Education premise before I was able to write the exams around 11:00 am,” he said.
It is still fresh in Nigerians memories how tech-glitches was reported to had significantly marred the 2025 UTME due to a crucial system patch being improperly installed at 157 examination centres, primarily in the South-East and Lagos.
Many JAMB candidates reportedly filed complaints citing technical glitches, ranging from frozen screens to complete inaccessibility that delayed or prevented them from taking the computer-based test.
This technical error led to the failure to properly validate candidate answers, resulting in skewed, low scores for almost 380,000 candidates.
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) admitted fault, apologised for the widespread failure and impact on candidates, and offered a chance for affected individuals to retake the examination.
Recall that Tmilehin Faith, a 19-year-old student committed suicide as a result of JAMB’s trauma, which left her with a score of 190 out of the obtainable 400 marks.
In August 2025, the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) acknowledged technical glitches and errors in the grading of the 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) results, particularly for serialised core subjects.
This led WAEC to temporarily withdraw access to the result portal to review and correct the errors, apologising to affected students and parents for the issues and the emotional distress caused.
Stakeholders are worried that Nigerian universities are embracing digital solutions without adequately addressing the risks of systemic glitches, thereby punishing innocent students for technical errors.
Tech-glitches during exams has become a norm in Nigeria, and students are the ones left to bear the brunt, while most of the examination institutions are not improving their systems.
One candidate recounted how she nearly fainted upon receiving the email. “I got this same message last night and started shaking,” she said.
Every year funds are allocated to these institutions without accountability.
Nubi Achebo, director of academic planning at Nigerian University of Technology and Management (NUTM), described the development as being worrisome.
Achebo emphasised that the impact on the psyche of students, and the education system raises concerns, especially now that Nigeria is geared towards transition to CBT.
“The glitches bug surge would induce stress and anxiety on the psyche of pupils, psychological distress and give room for uncertainty and frustration, among other ill effects,” he noted.
Christopher Nmeribe, a teacher said the surge instances of tech-glitches during examinations can affect students’ self-confidence, preparedness and ability which may lead to feelings of incompetence, and frustration.
This tech-glitches incident has once again reopened the conversation about Nigeria’s digital infrastructure readiness.
A concern is Nigeria’s data centre ecosystem. Despite a millions of dollar investment in local data infrastructure, roughly 70 megawatts of data centre capacity is available nationwide, much lower than what is needed to support a robust digital economy.
Data from industry trackers indicate that Galaxy Backbone, the only Tier III Uptime Institute-certified data centre in Nigeria’s public sector, operates less than its 2.5MW capacity.
“There’s no denying that Nigeria lacks sufficient infrastructure to handle nationwide online examinations at the scale the examination bodies are operating.
There is also the question of data reliability. Experts warn that server instability during result processing could lead to data corruption or computational errors in candidate scores.
These shortcomings call for the government intervention to curb these unnecessary anxieties imposed on Nigeria youngsters who desire to further their education.
After all, education should be a right to all Nigerian child and not the selected few.
