THE Registrar of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof Ishaq Oloyede, has disclosed that a father has been arrested for writing this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) for his son.
Oloyede, who disclosed this on Wednesday, April 24, in Kaduna, while inspecting Computer Based Test (CBT) centres in the state in the ongoing UTME, did not, however, reveal any further details about the arrested father, but frowned at examination cheaters, saying: “It does not pay.”
Oloyede said that no fewer than 1.94 million candidates are projected to sit for the UTME in the country, adding that at the end of the examination, there would be less than 100,000 candidates remaining in Lagos, Benue and other states in the country.
He explained that the pace at which JAMB cleared candidates and captured biometrics made the exercise faster, noting that this was part of JAMB’s re-engineering process towards ensuring hitch-free exercise.
“Even today, I have seen something which we need to improve on, but most importantly, we have done so many things in the background to make the exercise faster, more efficient and better. We have increased the level of automation.”
He stated that most of the problems JAMB faced were impersonation, as most of the cases were candidates who have double National Identification Number (NIN), adding that JAMB would take up the issue with the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC).
“The important thing is that we are ahead of the impersonators. We have arrested a father writing examinations for his son. That kind of parenting in this generation is uncalled for. I wonder what the father will tell the son if they are locked up in the same cell.
“We now have the facilities to check all sorts of impersonation and other malpractices,” he said.
The Registrar, however, thanked parents for their support, saying that unlike in previous years when they were seen loitering around examination centres, there had been no reported case of parents intruding, except in one state, where they felt since the first session failed, their children should not continue with the second or other sessions.
“Out of the country’s 775 centres, those who failed were not up to 20, and only one failed. Less than 30 of the centres failed at the first session because of ill preparation.
“When such things happen, candidates should stay aside for the next session to move, because questions are designed individually for a candidate,” he said.
