The Registrar of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, said on Wednesday that at least 1, 178,665 candidates scored 100 and above in the March 9 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).
Oloyede disclosed this when members of the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption (PACAC) led by its Chairman, Prof. Itse Sagay, visited the JAMB headquarters in Abuja.
He said out of 1,840,225 candidates who wrote the examination, only 800,000 had the five credits ordinary level (O’ level) minimum requirements.
He said: “There are 767 tertiary higher institutions in Nigeria and about 560,168 candidates have been admitted. About 20 per cent of the candidates are in SS2, they only took JAMB for trials.”
The JAMB registrar said the collusion of parents in examination malpractices remained a major challenge for the Board.
This, he said questioned the credibility of the organization.
According to him, most parents have gone haywire in their desire to ensure their children pass the examination at all cost.
Oloyede expressed his displeasure on how parents paid huge amount of money into fraudulent account in order to pave way for their wards.