The Vice Chancellor, Salem University Lokoja, Prof. Alewo Johnson-Akubo, has urged the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) to urgently checkmate candidates’ manipulation of results.
The vice chancellor, who made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lokoja on Monday, said that suppressing such would save the education standard from dwindling.
Recall that JAMB, in a statement on Sunday said it had withdrawn the result of a candidate of the just-released Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) result over alleged manipulation of her scores.
The board had claimed that one Miss Mmesoma Ejikeme, inflated her result and announced that she scored 362 in the 2023 UTME.
She was awarded a three N3 million naira scholarship by Chief Innocent Chukwuma, Chairman, Innoson Vehicles Manufacturing company and was about to be honoured by the Anambra Government before she was exposed.
According to Johnson-Akubo, this development is not good for the image of JAMB and Nigeria as a nation.
He said that the board should rise to the occasion and nip the evil in the bud before it affected the educational standard.
“Certainly, this is a cankerworm that must not be allowed to dwindle our educational standard nor give Nigeria a bad image before the international community.
“It also means that our universities should equally ensure they do thorough investigation into the status of all candidates admitted for programmes to deprive such manipulators from having their ways.
“For us in Salem University Lokoja, JAMB discovery is a blessing to us; more so that we just ended our 2022/2023 academic session with a thanksgiving on Sunday, and has commenced admission into programmes for the 2023/2024 session,’’ he said.
Johnson-Akubo, however, said that beginning from July 3, applications into the university’s fully accredited programmes such as Law, Accounting, Mass Communication, Geology and Computer Science would be welcome.”
He advised interested candidates to inculcate the fear of God and truthfulness as they applied for any of the institution’s programmes to avoid issues with the management.