The management of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has approved an initial payment of N3, 006,339,897 to Computer-Based Test (CBT) centres as part of the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) service charges.
The payment related to the resit examination is still under review.
JAMB has expressed surprise at the outcry from CBT centres regarding this payment, which has been accompanied by various accusations against the Board that appear to be attempts at blackmail.
While the Board acknowledged that the centres’ concerns, particularly in light of ongoing investigations into their operations by security agencies, it emphasizes that any centres found to be in violation of regulations will not receive payment.
This has led to perceived pressure tactics from some centres to secure payment prior to the conclusion of the examination process. Traditionally, JAMB disburses payments only after the completion of the main mop-up exercise, which has yet to take place.
It is important to note that these centres have previously received weekly payments during the registration phase until its conclusion and are familiar with the established procedures and timelines for the disbursement of examination charges, which typically occur after the UTME has been conducted.
JAMB remains resolute in not yielding to what it describes as blackmail from the centres. The decision to make this payment is intended to prevent unnecessary distractions, especially as the Board retains the ability to recover funds from any centres implicated in ongoing investigations, even if it means instituting legal procedures.
Payments for the resit UTME will be processed once the mop-up exercises completed.
In a related development, the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has offered to collaborate with JAMB on areas of mutual interest particularly in the conduct of the Board’s UTME.
The intervention of the agency was in respect of the technical glitch experienced in the just concluded 2025 UTME. The agency stated this during the visit of its delegation, led by the Director of Information Technology (IT), Project Clearance Unit, Dr. Usman Abdullahi Gambo, to the Board’s National Headquarters, Abuja.
The proposed areas of collaboration, according to Dr. Gambo, include the conduct of a comprehensive technical review of the Board’s systems and processes that contributed to the glitch.
The delegation is also to identify the root causes of the glitch and provide recommendations for system improvement and robust quality assurance mechanisms while exploring and recommending measures to prevent a recurrence of such incidents in future examinations.
The Registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, in his remarks, welcomed the delegation and promised that the Board would continue to make their existing inter-agency relationship more robust and cordial.
The registrar later took the delegation through the various stages of registration, examination administration, conduct, release of results and the various quality control mechanisms of the Board.