JAMB reveals staggering number of counterfeit A-level results employed for ‘direct entry’ university admissions
The Joint Admission and Matriculation Board says it uncovered at least 1,665 fake A-level results during the direct entry registration process.
JAMB’s weekly bulletin on Tuesday said the exam body’s registrar, Is-haq Oloyede, gave the figures when he received officials of the National Association of Nigeria Colleges of Education Students in his office.
He explained that the A-level results verification was occasioned by the system’s endemic corruption and the need to restore the integrity of the admission process.
According to him, 397 of the fake results were from colleges of education, 453 were university diplomas, and the rest were for other A-level certificates.
Mr Oloyede said the institutions must take measures to safeguard the integrity of their certificates, adding that JAMB would continue to scrutinise the certificates through measures that would stand the test of time.
The registrar recalled that in the past, when a candidate applied for direct entry, JAMB would simply ask awarding institutions to do the necessary screening and due diligence.
He, however, said JAMB was dumbfounded by the startling revelations from Bayero University, Kano, where out of the 148 direct entry applications to the institution, only six of the certificates forwarded for processing were genuine.
The registrar added that the discovery of this monumental fraud prompted the meeting of critical stakeholders, who charted ways of combating the menace.
Part of the measures suggested, he said, was the constitution of an A-level result verification task force as well as the creation of a common platform for the verification of A-level results and certificates.
He said the platform was reliable and user-friendly, and verifying any certificate only took five minutes.
Mr Oloyede also disclosed that the board had adopted a “no verification, no admission” policy.
The registrar said 15 institutions had not sufficiently complied with the verification requests from the board, adding that more than 20 unverified candidates were affected.
He also mentioned that JAMB would have to pre-verify candidates applying with the certificates of the 15 institutions before they could complete their DE registration process.
According to him, candidates could register through ongoing direct entry registration while the school verifies them on the back end.
He, however, declared that the 15 institutions, which were yet to comply fully, would have to pre-verify holders of their certificates before they complete the registration process.
(NAN)
