JAMB abolishes N100m annual allocation to state offices

The Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) says it would no longer give N100 million annual allocation to its state offices because they’re “making profits.”

Ishaq Oloyode, the board’s registrar, disclosed this on Wednesday at the opening of a two-day meeting with CBT centres, technical advisors, and internet service providers.

He said, before now, JAMB had a routine which sees it allocate the said sum to its state offices “for one thing or the other” even when some run private CBT centres.

Stating that the board is willing to close down offices not being useful, Oloyede added that the routine is henceforth abolished as the offices’ revenue had been subjected to scrutiny since 2018.

“Recall that since 2016, we do give at least N100m to state offices for one thing or the other. We want to tell you that, this year, no kobo will be released for anybody for anything, because those who are running private CBT centres are making profits,” he said.

“We are paying salaries of all staff and in addition, we still take care of offices through quarterly allocation. We started last year to see how much you bring in. Henceforth, I won’t go into government coffers to give you money. We can close down any centre that is not useful to us,” he said.

Oloyede also said some CBT centres are tampering with CCTV cameras in connivance with JAMB technical officers.

The registrar, for this reason, sought the assistance of the Computer Professional Registration Council of Nigeria (CPRCN) to pay particular attention to CCTV.

“You know, there are infractions during registration and examinations and we have punished infractions we detected. We will not tolerate it no matter how little,” he added.

JAMB had earlier stated that it’s not backtracking on its decision to use National Identity Management (NIM) numbers in the conduct of its exams.