The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) on Saturday scrapped the use of National Identity Number for registration in this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) and Direct Entry exam because of inadequate enrollment centres.
The board noted that the 1,000 enrollment centres operated by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) nationwide were not enough to successfully register applicants ahead of the conduct of the examinations.
Registration for this year’s examination will commence on Monday 13 January and end on the 17 of February while the examination will start on 14 of March and end on the 4 of April 2020.
The board directed applicants to send their names to 55019 to create their profile for registration.
JAMB Registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede said this during a briefing with reporters on Saturday at the headquarters of the board in Bwari, Abuja. He was accompanied by the Director- General of NIMC, Aliyu Aziz, at the briefing.
The Federal Executive Council (FEC) had directed JAMB to adopt the use of NIN in its registration process for the conduct of its examinations without stating the time to commence implementation.
Oloyede said: “We had agreed that NIN would be a pre-requisite for registration for 2020 UTME which will commence on Monday. But there was public outcry on the frustrations and difficulties that candidates are subjected to before getting the NIN.
“We were forced to review our strategies and we arrived at a point that it was obvious that we could not go ahead with NIN as pre-requisite for registration because of the challenges that might affect the participation of large number of candidates.
“To this end, we have decided to suspend the use of NIN for 2020 UTME exercise. We have unanimously agreed to shift the use of NIN to 2021 when candidates must have been given enough time and opportunity to get the NIN. However, about 11, 000 of our staff, permanent and adhoc, that would participate in the exercise would still be required to submit their NIN for verification.”
Oloyede explained that the adoption of the number for registration was aimed at curbing multiple registration and other infractions during the conduct of its examinations, adding that the board was ready to fish out exam fraudsters during the conduct of this year’s exams.
In his remarks, NIMC DG said the commission needed 4,000 enrollment centres nationwide to carry out registration services anytime.
Aziz said the commission would improve on its facilities and manpower ahead of 2021 UTME exercise.
He admonished applicants that would participate in the 2021 UTME exercise to start the process of getting their NIN as early as possible to avoid the rush that would come with the deadline.
The Nation
