The Senate has mandated its committee on Education to invite the head of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Professor Debu Ojerinde over his controversial admission policy.
It asked its committee on Education to inquire into the circumstances surrounding the new policy including allegations of favouritism and to review the power of JAMB in relation to admission.
This followed the adoption of a motion on “JAMB’s new admission policy” sponsored by Senator Joshua Lidani (Gombe South) and seven others.
Lidani reminded the Senate that JAMB is a Board created by an Act of the National Assembly in 1989 to administer a centralized admission system for universities, polytechnics and colleges of education in the country.
He noted that by Section 5(1)(C)111 of the JAMB’s Act 2004, the functions of the Board among other things, is the general control of the conduct of matriculation examinations for admission into all universities, polytechnics and colleges of education and also include the placement of suitably qualified candidates in the tertiary institutions having taken into account, the preferences expressed of otherwise indicated by candidates for certain tertiary institutions and courses.
“I am aware that JAMB at its Combined Policy Meeting held on July 14, 2015 in Abuja, announced the adoption of a policy whereby candidates of universities with surplus applicants for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) are reassigned to other universities with lower number of candidates than their capacities,” he said.
Lidani said that following the announcement of the new policy, the Board was faced with a series of protests by parents, candidates and some Organizations of Tutorial School Operators of Nigeria over the new admission policy.
The lawmaker said that the new policy runs contrary to the letters and spirit of Section 5(1) ©111 of the JAMB Act which requires the Board to take into account preferences of the candidates in their choice of schools.
The Senate asked JAMB to increase the validity of its results from one to three years to reduce the number of yearly applicants.