By Felix Khanoba
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) says all is now set for this year’s mock Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) scheduled for this Saturday nationwide.
Registrar of JAMB, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, who expressed the readiness of the Board to conduct a seamless mock exam ahead of the 2022 UTME, said the exam body has allowed Computer Based Test (CBT) centres to slightly increase service charge for candidates’ registration as a result of high cost of diesel.
The JAMB boss told newsmen in Abuja on Tuesday that the initial amount permitted to be charged was N700 but due to the energy crisis, no centre is now expected to charge above N1000.
“Yes we have allowed the accredited CBT centres, we have even said anybody who can decrease can do so, but we have hitherto asked the centres not to charge more than N700 naira, now we have seen the reality, and we said they could charge up to N1000.
“So the reality is the truth, unless you don’t want them to conduct the examination, we have done the analysis of their expenses and if we insist they must put on their Air Conditioners, it means the cost of generator or diesel has to be taken into consideration. We are not increasing our charges,” he noted.
Speaking on the falseful accusation by the House of Representatives on payment of alleged multiple fees by JAMB candidates, Oloyede expressed concerns that the lawmakers could initiate probe over an issue that is baseless and lacks merit.
Oloyede, who has been nominated by Vanguard Newspapers for an award of excellence, said he was a bit disappointed over the ugly development.
Recall that the House of Representatives had in its plenary session recently, took a resolution to probe JAMB over alleged imposition of multiple fees on candidates, following a motion raised by Sergius Ogun, PDP-Edo.
The House had listed charges on printing of JAMB result slip, N1000, printing of admission letter N1000, change of institution/course N2500 and retrieving of registration number N1000 as areas it intends to probe the Board.
But Oloyede said he had expected the lawmakers to be more factual in their allegations, rather than peddling falsehood which could pass for a calculated attempt to derail the examination agency from its mandate.
He said, “as regards the resolution of the House, I will not want to talk about it, we feel that the purpose was to discourage us, but we won’t be discouraged, I believe I should not talk about it until we are invited, its an allegation but we expected that an allegation to come from the House should be something solid and based on facts.
“So I am a bit disappointed that somebody could use absolute falsehood just to embarrass us, if it is the intention as we expect to discourage us from doing what we are doing, we will not be deterred, we expect Nigerians to know Nigerians to know when their representatives are doing what is right and what is not right, I can’t say more than that for now.”
