Admission crisis hits varsities, only two schools meet deadline

Forty days after the deadline set by the Joint
Admissions and Matriculation Board's to tertiary
institutions to complete the 2013/2014 admission, only
two universities have fully complied with the
directive, The PUNCH exclusively gathered on
Monday.
The schools are the University of Benin, Edo State and
the Federal University, Lokoja, Kogi State.
The non-compliance, analysts say, may result in
admission crisis in the institutions, especially with
the ongoing strike by lecturers in the nation's public
universities.
Over 1.5 million candidates wrote this year's Unified
Tertiary Matriculation Examination for universities,
polytechnics and colleges of education.
The Fourth Combined Policy Committee's meeting on
admissions to tertiary institutions, chaired by the
former Minister of Education, Prof. Ruqayyatu Rufai,
fixed October 31 as the deadline for the schools to
complete the 2013/2014 admission exercise.
The committee, comprising heads of tertiary
institutions, met in Abuja on June 18 and fixed the
deadline.
Curiously, the board has begun the sale of
application forms for the 2014/2015 admission and
the examination holds in April 2014.
Specifically, our correspondent gathered that
Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria and the Petroleum
Training Institute, Efurun, Delta State, did not submit
any admission list to JAMB.
A source in the board, who craved anonymity, said
its leadership was not pleased with the conduct of
the institutions.
He said, "Other universities, polytechnics and
colleges of education submitted only about 40 to 70
per cent of their students' intake. They failed to meet
the deadline to complete the process. From the look
of things, many potential candidates will be denied
admission next year owing to the nonchalant
attitude of the universities."
The PUNCH gathered that JAMB might request the
Federal Ministry of Education to sanction the errant
institutions.
It was learnt that the board would soon write the
Supervising Minister of Education, Nyesom Wike, to
mete out appropriate sanctions against the affected
schools.
When contacted the Head, Public Relations of JAMB,
Fabian Benjamin, confirmed the development.
He, however, refused to give details of the admission
list.
He said, "I can tell you that we have received some
admission lists from institutions. But they are not
complete."
Asked if the board would sanction institutions that
did not meet the deadline, Benjamin said it was a
decision for the JAMB's Governing Board to take.
He added, "The board will meet very soon. It will look
at all the issues and take the best decision in the
circumstance."
He, nonetheless, said the failure to meet the deadline
could cause "disruption of academic calendar,
psychological imbalance on the parts of parents and
students, disruption of plans of JAMB, and could
block the chances of candidates who may want to
change their admission to another institution."
The JAMB Registrar/Chief Executive, Prof. Dibu
Ojerinde, at the meeting in Abuja had said all
admissions for 2013/2014 would end by October 31.
Ojerinde said, "All Nigerians must be given
opportunity to mix and educate freely in any part of
the country.
"Private institutions should however give us
acceptable and national ratio they want to adopt in
the admission exercise."
The JAMB boss had also maintained that ratio
45:35:20 for merit, catchment and educationally less
developed states for federal institutions, and
40:40:20 for state-owned institutions were still in
force and "should be adhered to strictly to ensure
national cohesion."
Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Academic Staff
Union of Universities, Gombe State University
chapter, has expressed concern over the exodus of
Nigerian students to other countries for studies.
Adamu, who criticised the situation, told the News
Agency of Nigeria in Gombe on Monday that it was
not good for the educational development of the
country.
He expressed concern over the movement of the
students to other countries that had lesser quality of
staff.
He said, "It is shameful if you discover the way
Nigerians from undergraduate to postgraduate
students are leaving for other countries for the sake
of studies. It is not because they have quality staff
and other things.
"In Nigeria, we have all it takes to maintain standard
in our universities but it is because the government
is not serious about putting things in the right way.
That is why generally our university system has
decayed. A lot of people have left for other countries
that give priority to education and this is leading to a
very serious brain drain in our system."
The chairman, who advised the Federal Government
to honour its agreement with the union, linked the
problems in the nation's education to frequent crises
in the sector.
Adamu added, "The lingering crisis has a very
devastating effect on the educational development
and general development of the country."
Source: Punch