The Registrar of Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, says the era of malpractices in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) is over.
Oloyede said this in his address at the foundation laying ceremony of the board’s International Talent Resort Centre on Wednesday in Gbongan town, Ayedaade Local Government Area of the state.
He said that no amount of blackmail would deter the board from its avowed mission of ridding the education system of malpractices and examination syndicates in the country.
Oloyede noted that in the past five years, JAMB had strengthened its processes such that opportunities to commit examination malpractices had been substantially blocked.
According to him, the recent “exaggerated uproar” on the poor performance of candidates who sat for 2021 UTME is “misplaced”.
The JAMB registrar said that many of the candidates who sat for the examination failed because of fake digital past UTME questions and answers in circulation by ” a cartel” before the examination.
Many may not have noticed that shortly before the commencement of 2021 UTME, a cartel published a fake digital past UTME Question Papers and was circulating fake questions and answers claiming to be genuinely from JAMB.
“Many parents who fell for the scam must have now realised how wrong they and their not so innocent children were.
“This explains why many students had to collapse in the examination hall when reality stared them in the face.
“This is a lesson for people to realize that the days of examination malpractice in JAMB conducted examinations is over and over forever”.
Oloyede also said that government and security agencies needed to pay attention to “miracle centres”, which he said was wreaking havoc on public examinations.
A recent experiment by Bayero University, Kano, shows that as high as nine per cent of the A/level results being churned out (courtesy of these tutorial centres) are fake.
“Tertiary institutions also need to pay particular attention to the fact that these examination fraudsters parading themselves as tutorial masters are infiltrating vastly and deeply into the institutions’ Interim Joint Matriculation Board (IJMB) and Joint Universities Preliminary Examination Board (JUPEB) units, wreaking untold havoc on the education system”.
He, however, said that with the standard of Computer Based Test (CBT) centres, the activities of the miracle centres had been eliminated in respect of UTME.
“The states and security agencies, therefore, need to pay sufficient attention to the fast expanding illicit education gangsters,” he said.
Oloyede also said that the directive by Federal Government on the use of NIN for UTME had improved the capacity of the board to eliminate impersonation during UTME.
Oloyede, however, said that it was quite disturbing that even some parents/guardians as well as some school proprietors/administrators were also deeply involved in examination fraud.
On the resort centre, Oloyede said it was programmed to be an integrated ultra-modern educational facility to serve all researchers, particularly those engaged in various academic services of the Board.
He said the first phase of the project, which would gulp N280 million, would comprise of an office and 550 seater CBT centres, adding that the project is in four phases.
“On completion, the resort shall provide a world-class research facility in a serene environment.”
The centre is conceived to be a centre where scholars, particularly those engaged by the Board for various academic purposes, will converge,” he said.
In his remarks, Gov. Gboyega Oyetola, said the siting of the Centre in Osun, no doubt underscored the existing robust collaboration and partnership between the Board and the state.
Oyetola, who was represented by Secretary to State Government, Mr Wole Oyebamiji, commended the board and the Federal Government for siting the centre in the state.
Also speaking, Oba Adetoyese Oyeniyi, the Olufi of Gbongan, thanked the board for finding the town worthy to host the resort centre.
Mr Wale Babalakin (SAN), who is an indigene of the town, commended the Federal Government and the board for citing the centre in the state.
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