During the 2023 Direct Entry registration exercise, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) revealed the discovery of at least 1,665 counterfeit A’level results.

Addressing the issue of corruption within the A’level results verification system, Registrar Prof. Is-haq Oloyede made these revelations while meeting with the leadership of the National Association of Nigeria Colleges of Education Students in Abuja on Tuesday.

Among the uncovered fake results, 397 hailed from Colleges of Education, 453 were university diplomas, with the remainder comprising various other A’level certificates.

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Expressing concern over the integrity of such certificates, Oloyede emphasized the need for robust measures to uphold their credibility.

The registrar highlighted previous practices where awarding institutions were solely responsible for screening and due diligence during Direct Entry applications.

Shocked by findings from Bayero University, Kano, which revealed a vast majority of forged certificates among applications, JAMB convened stakeholders to address the issue.

Proposed measures included the establishment of an A’level result verification task force and a unified platform for certificate verification, ensuring efficiency and reliability within five minutes per certificate. Notably, JAMB introduced a “No verification, No admission” policy to underscore the significance of the exercise.

Institutions failing to sufficiently comply with verification requests were listed, and those with over 20 unverified candidates were mandated to pre-verify applicants before completing DE registration. However, candidates were allowed to proceed with registration while awaiting verification on the backend.

NANCES President Eegunjobi Samuel lauded JAMB’s efforts in restoring integrity to examination and admission processes. Presenting members’ grievances regarding challenges in the ongoing 2024 DE registration, Samuel requested additional registration centers to facilitate smoother operations.

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