The Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board (JAMB), said it has spent the sum of N1billion last year for the expansion of its facilities, declaring that, 15,000 centres would be created for prospective UTME candidates this year.
It equally revealed that, the agency had introduced Central Admission Processing System (CAPS) in a bid to address the imbalance observed in the admission process for the applicants.
Is’ haq Olanrewaju Oloyede, Professor of Islamic Studies, the Registrer of JAMB dropped the hint in Ilorin recently in an interactive session with journalists.
According to him, with the introduction of CAPS, the process of admission into higher institutions of learning in the country has become more transparent, reduce costs and block leakages.
He added that, there was no need for any institution to come to the Headquarters of the board for certain rectitude anymore.
Oloyede, the former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ilorin noted the system involved by the agency is making 90 percent of admission to be based on merit and a total of two million applicants are expected to register for 2018 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME)
He also revealed that the body returned a sum of N7.8billion to the Federal Government coffers from the proceeds of examination forms sold in 2017 just as he stated that the fund was sourced from the N12billion income made during the year.
He said the board had effected changes in the process and procedure for registration and conduct of examination for candidates to curb malpractices in the processes.
Debunking insinuations from some quarters that the board increased the examination fee, which enabled its milestone, the JAMB boss said “we have not increased any cost but rather, reduced fee for the examination.” Oloyede who said it has been tough and challenging for the agency in year 2017, stressed that with the support of people, they were able to succeed.
He promised to continue to do things properly, welcome constructive criticisms and committed to changing the process by internalising the system.
SIKIRAT SHEHU, Ilorin
