In a recent development, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has announced its decision to withhold the identities of the top performers in the 2024 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).
The announcement was made by Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, the Registrar, during a press conference in Bwari on Monday. He emphasized that the UTME is viewed by the board as a ranking examination, not a competition.
The board is determined to avoid a repeat of the ‘Mmesoma incident’ that occurred in the aftermath of the 2023 UTME. This incident involved a 19-year-old student, Ejikeme Mmesoma, who inaccurately claimed to have scored 362, while her actual score on the JAMB portal was 249.
Prof. Oloyede revealed that a total of 1,989,668 candidates registered for the examinations, which were conducted in 774 computer-based test centres across 118 towns. He reiterated the board’s stance on not publishing the names of its highest-scoring candidates, as the UTME is considered a ranking examination.
He further explained that due to the different criteria adopted by various institutions, it would be impractical to generate a list of candidates with the highest admissible scores. Admission remains the ultimate goal, and it might be presumptuous to declare a particular candidate as the highest scorer, especially since such a candidate might not even secure admission in the end.
However, in response to public demand and to prevent a recurrence of the Mmesoma incident, the board urges all parties interested in awarding prizes to high-performing candidates to verify the claims of candidates before offering such awards.
