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By Gabriel Dike
No fewer than 1,5milliom candidates have so far registered for the 2022 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) and the Direct Entry forms.
The board said the sales of the UTME/DE would close on March 26th, 2022.
The Registrar of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, who disclosed this while monitoring the UTME/DE registration exercise Kano, said that over 1.512, 739million candidates have registered as at Saturday, March 19th.
In a related development, JAMB Registrar has suspended two major financial institutions engaged in the vending of its e-pins.
Oloyede, who visited AUA Technologies Ltd CBT Centre, Kano; Emirate College of Health Sciences and Technology & Entrepreneurship CBT Centre, Kabuga Satellite Town, Kano, and the JAMB PTC, zonal office, however, noted the low turnout of candidates in the various centres and enjoined prospective candidates to come out and register saying the board would not extend the registration exercise.
The registrar, who had witnessed the low turnout of candidates at some of the centres visited, decried the situation whereby candidates who refused to come out to register in the meantime, would turn around to swamp the registration centres at the close of registration to demand extension of the exercise.
He had noted that there were only one or two candidates waiting to be registered at these centres, which are equipped with over 20 registration points and capacity to register more than 300 each day.
While addressing the press later at the Board’s Zonal Office, Kano, Oloyede explained that it was practically impossible for the Board to contemplate extending the registration period owing to the intense negotiations involved in arriving at the current arrangements.
He took advantage of the monitoring exercise to inspect the ongoing construction work at the Board’s Zonal Office, which has been stalled by the fluctuations in the price of construction materials.
Prof. Oloyede noted that like the mega centres being constructed in Kaduna with the board’s IGR, the contractors have requested variation of the contract value and requesting price fluctuations beyond the 20% allowable by law for agencies, a situation which has made it necessary to seek the approval of the Federal Executive Council.
On the suspension, Prof. Oloyede, during a meeting with financial institutions (vendors) engaged in the vending of the 2022 UTME/DE e-PINs, announced the immediate suspension and blacklisting of the two vendors for allowing their agents to vend the e-PINs above the stipulated price of N4, 700 (cumulative cost).
Oloyede explained that the board would, besides blacklisting these institutions, retrieve the details of their culpable agents for prosecution as well as report their misdeeds to the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to ensure that the extorted candidates are fully refunded.
The JAMB boss further disclosed that the board understands the pains of the two vendors for the embarrassment caused them by their agents and, as such accepts their apologies and their commitment to ensure that all the culprits are fished out and sanctioned.
He, however, reiterated the board’s zero tolerance for irregularities and, added that the two vendors could not be completely exonerated from the malfeasance of their agents. Hence, he announced the suspension of the two vendors in line with the prior warnings issued to all Board’s service partners that they would be responsible for any misdeeds of their agents.
He charged all vendors to monitor the activities of their agents, as the Board would continue to hold all principals responsible for any breaches they committed.
