Fred Ezeh, Abuja
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), yesterday, deregistered 14 privately-owned Computer Based Test (CBT) centres in some parts of the country, for what it described as deceit and technical infractions.
The affected CBT centres were among 712 JAMB accredited CBT centres nationwide; to participate in the mock examination and 2019 UTME scheduled for next week.
The board said it realised that the affected CBT centres borrowed computer systems, during accreditation, to make up the number of required computer systems to get JAMB accreditation for the 2019 UTME.
Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, announced the development in Abuja, shortly after he, alongside the Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, and other government officials monitored the mock examination in some CBT centres in Abuja, ahead of the UTME.
He said: “Of 712 accredited CBT centres for the mock and UTME examination, we were forced to deregister 14 of them, yesterday morning, for one infraction or the other.
“We realised that some of the CBT centres borrowed computer systems to make up the number of computers required for accreditation. And on the examination day, the computers were not found at the CBT centres.
“Others had technical and other issues which necessitated the decision of JAMB to deregister them.”
Meanwhile, he explained that JAMB successfully redistributed the affected candidates to nearby CBT centres so they could participate in the examination.
JAMB introduced the mock examination in 2017, as optional for UTME candidates. It was an opportunity for JAMB to test its systems and acquaint candidates with the CBT test ahead of the examination.
Candidates interested for the mock examination must have indicated interest during registration. Those who chose JAMB-owned CBT centres wrote the examination at no cost while those in private CBT centres paid N700 only.