The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has refuted the allegation that the Unified tertiary and Matriculation Examination (UTME) umpire board targeted the Baptist Girls’ Academy in Lagos, during the board’s inspection of registration centres.
Recall the Baptist Girls’ Academy had accused the JAMB Registrar of profiling and conducting a media trial of the school after a video emerged in social media that the school was collecting more than the stipulated N4,700 registration fee from candidates.
Prof. Is’haq Oloyede, the JAMB Registrar, however, came out to say he was not aware of any extortion going on in the school. He explained that a simple dialogue between him and candidates at a registration centre during the board’s inspection was misconstrued on social media.
Dr. Fabian Benjamin, the Head of Public Affairs and Protocol of the board, in a statement gave details of events that led to the outcry.
”The Registrar was on an inspection of the 2021 UTME registration in the South-West and was accompanied by some pressmen.
”While at the JKK Computer-Based Test Centre, one of the Board’s approved UTME Registration centres, he interacted with some group of students from Baptist Girls Academy who said they had paid N8000 to their school for the 2021 UTME registration. He requested to see their teacher, upon interrogation, the teacher insisted that the school had only collected the approved fee of N4,700 from students”, he said.
Benjamin noted that while the Registrar planned to reconcile the discrepancies with the school authority, it emerged on the news that JAMB had accused the school of extortion without recourse to details.
”The Board would want to dissuade the public from misinterpreting this happenstance. It should be noted that the Board had, on some occasions, sanctioned faith-based schools located in the Northern part of the country with no eyebrows raised from any quarters.
“The Board wishes to reiterate that it had always been its core policy to sanction any school that collects a dime above the approved UTME fee particularly when such acts are linked to the Board’s hard-earned name and integrity”, he explained in the statement.
