Fred Ezeh, Abuja
Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) said its preliminary records indicated that South East states of Imo, Anambra and Enugu top the list of states with high record of examination malpractices in just concluded 2020 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).
Other states on the list included; Abia, Adamawa, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Kwara, Ondo, Oyo, and Osun. JAMB said that 149 candidates were caught in different attempts during the examination which ended last Sunday
Imo, Anambra and Enugu States had 26, 12 and 12 cases each, and JAMB has published the names and states of the 149 candidates on its weekly bulletin.
The offences, according to JAMB, included; examination by proxy, attempt to cheat, forceful entrance, tampering with examination documents, smuggling of mobile phones into the examination halls among others.
The board confirmed that examination malpractices declined in 2020 UTME. Out of the 1,945,983 million candidates that sat the examination, it said that prima facie cases of examination misconduct have been established against the 149 candidates whose names were published in its weekly bulletin.
It said: “We successfully concluded 2020 UTME exercise in most states on Thursday, March 19. Meanwhile, 10 other states completed theirs on Saturday, March 21, while Bayelsa with only four approved Computer-Based Test (CBT) centres after a number of the centres have been delisted for one infraction or the other had to complete theirs on Sunday based on an understanding with stakeholders in Bayelsa not to extend the examination beyond Sunday.
“Out of 1, 945,983 candidates that registered for the examination nationwide, about 0.3 percent were absent. 99 percent of the results of the candidates who took the examination from Saturday, March 14, to Saturday, March 22, have been released.”
JAMB however insisted that it would review all the Close Circuit Television (CCTV) footages and other installed technical gadgets for possible examination misconduct to fish out candidates who committed crimes or officials who either aided or abated crime.
It added: “We would not hesitate to withdraw the result of candidates found to have perpetrated any form of examination malpractice.”