» 59,000 Candidates To Retake Examination - JAMB «

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board on Friday
said the board would reschedule examination for
candidates who missed the Unified Tertiary Matriculation
Examination because of relocation of centres by the board.
The board said it relocated 59,000 candidates in 15 states
because of problems in some of the centres.
It also said candidates who had system failure during the
examination would retake it, if the board finds their
complaint to be genuine.
The Registrar of the board, Prof. Dibu Ojerinde, who said
this at a press conference in Abuja, added that the new
development does not affect candidates who missed the
examination deliberately or failed in the examination.
Ojerinde said among the 1,546,633 candidates that sat for
the 2016 UTME, 145,704 had issues of multiple results,
which have been resolved by the board.
Prof. Ojerinde added that 23,577 candidates were absent on
the day of the examination.
“We relocated candidates where the board had challenges.
The board is looking at some of the issues raised during
the examination, but most of the excuses raised by
candidates are flimsy,” he said.
“We relocated about 59, 000 candidates due to the
problems in various centres which vary from town to town.
There are about 59,000 of them spread across 15 states of
the federation.
“Those that were relocated never suffered any setback or
inconvenience. For all these two sets of people, I want to
apologise sincerely for what happened to them, but we are
going to put on a redress for those whose relocation
affected them in missing their examination.
“Let me use this opportunity to offer explanation on the
issue of the much-publicized two results. The process of
our marking involves transformation and other qualitative
programming. In the process of these configurations, we
had a little challenge which we quickly corrected and
ensured that this never happened in subsequent results.
This challenge was only associated with the candidates
that sat for this examination on Saturday, 27, and some
candidates of Monday, 29 February, 2016.”
Prof. Ojerinde said the board found out that some of the
over 500 centres used for the CBT was compromised by
the operators.
He said that one of its centres in Uromi, Edo State was
invaded by mercenaries during the examination.
He blamed the education consultants for mobilizing
candidates to protest against the conduct of the
examination by the board, adding that the quality of the
centres used for UTME would not be compromised.
He said: “In our quest to have adequate and effective
centres for the exercise, we approved over 500 centres, but
unfortunately, some of the centre operators were not
sincere in proving us with the true position of their
facilities.
“They hired equipment during the period of accreditation
and other necessary apparatus and on the examination
day, they were found wanting. This led to relocation or
rescheduling of candidates from some of them to more
suitable centres.”
Ojerinde said Nigeria was ready to take the CBT
examination, adding that reverting to the PPT as directed
by the House of Representatives would amount to lack of
progress.
According to him, the CBT would be improved upon.
He said: “Even the physically challenged are taking the
CBT examination. One of the blind candidates scored 286,
so why should others complain?
“Going back to the Paper and Pencil Test will amount to
taking one step forward and two steps backwards.”
The Nation.