Private varsities didn't influence JAMB — Ade-Ojo

Private varsities didn’t influence JAMB — Ade-Ojo 23 Aug 2015 12:00 AM  The Founder of Elizade University, Ilara-Mokin, Ondo State, Chief Michael Ade-Ojo, has commended the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board for coming up with a new admission policy for the 2015/2016 academic year. He described the action as a right move in the right direction. Ade-Ojo, who is the Chairman of Toyota (Nigeria) Limited, in a statement sent to SUNDAY PUNCH, condemned the allegation from some quarters that private universities bribed JAMB to create the new policy. Ade-Ojo, however, stated that JAMB’s decision had nothing to do with private universities, adding that the problem of low enrolment of students was not peculiar to private universities alone, as there were some government-owned institutions that also faced the same problem. The decision by JAMB to peg the minimum cut-off marks for 2015/2016 admission into universities at 180 and raise the bar for certain federal universities to 250 marks had led to protests by applicants to the affected institutions The institutions are the University of Lagos, University of Ibadan, University of Benin, University of Nigeria and the Ahmadu Bello University. Applicants, who could not meet the cut-off points of their choice universities, were to be redistributed to other institutions with lower intake marks until the Federal Government overruled JAMB. Ade-Ojo said the yearly geometric increase in the number of admission seekers into Nigerian universities justified the action of the board. He further said JAMB had shown that it was capable of proffering a solution to admission problems faced by over 70 per cent of the applicants annually with the new policy. The proprietor argued that some of the public universities also got from the candidates JAMB distributed to universities with low enrolment. He said the distribution of candidates with a lower chance of admission to universities where they could be admitted was more beneficial to the candidates than to the universities that were asked to admit them. Ade-Ojo explained that the new policy was the outcome of JAMB’s determination to curb the excesses of some universities which made post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination an avenue to generate income without considering the future of the candidates. He said the board had demonstrated that its responsibilities were more than mere conducting matriculation examinations and pegging of cut-off marks but to also checkmate the admission processes of universities. Ade-Ojo said, “Only 30 per cent of the 1.4 million candidates that sat the last UTME have a realistic chance of gaining admission this year, in view of the carrying capacities of the universities. “But for a firm policy like the one JAMB just came up with, a university with 105,000 candidates and a carrying capacity of 9,000 would have invited all the candidates to buy its post-UTME screening forms sold for N7, 500. “The possibility of the new policy affecting the huge sum of money some public universities realise from the sales of post-UTME forms to all the candidates that applied to them made them to tactically withdraw their support for the board on the decision they jointly took.” Copyright PUNCH. All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from PUNCH. Contact: editor@punchng.com