Post-UTME: A luxury or a necessity

The Federal Government of Nigeria has taken the decision to scrap the Post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (Post-UTME) screening tests held by universities for candidates seeking admission into the universities.    The Federal Government of Nigeria introduced the policy of post-UTME screening (then known as post-JAMB) through the then Minister of Education, Professor Chinwe Obaji. This […]

The Federal Government of Nigeria has taken the decision to scrap the Post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (Post-UTME) screening tests held by universities for candidates seeking admission into the universities.
   The Federal Government of Nigeria introduced the policy of post-UTME screening (then known as post-JAMB) through the then Minister of Education, Professor Chinwe Obaji. This policy made it mandatory for all tertiary institutions to screen candidates after their JAMB results were released before they are admitted citing reasons that some candidates with scores of 280 and above in JAMB-UTME could not score 20% in the post-UTME extermination, which shows that those candidates must have cheated in their JAMB-UTME and could not pass the post-UTME examination because there was no way to cheat.
Introduction of the post-UTME has caused serious debates and arguments between and among stakeholders in the educational sector across Nigeria. Those against it raise the issue that most institutions have turned the post-UTME to a goldmine or a money making venture, that is, the universities that conduct post-UTME do so primarily to wring money from parents, whose children could not be admitted using JAMB-UTME results. Others see it as questioning the integrity and credibility of JAMB as the statutory body assigned to conduct admission examination.
On the other side of the argument, those for post-UTME said in order to have graduates that are nationally relevant and globally competitive there is a need for post-UTME because some students employ unethical means to pass JAMB-UTME and when they get admitted, they cannot write a simple formal letter. Some couldn’t even write their names. So the only way to sanitize the educational system is to introduce post-UTME. Another point raised by those supporting the post-UTME is that the facilities such as lecture halls, libraries, hostels and ICT in our universities are not enough to satisfy the overpopulated students that are admitted every year by the universities. This is evident by the fact that this year alone (2016) 1, 800, 000 candidates sat for JAMB-UTME, even though the candidates that are qualified for admission are not up to that number but the 378 JAMB accredited higher institutions in Nigeria can’t accommodate even half that figure.
The decision by the Federal Government of Nigeria to scrap the post-UTME might come as a welcome development for parents and candidates who are hoping to be admitted into one higher institution or the other, but the other way round is that the Government’s decision will surely result in admission dilemma where these higher institutions will be faced with overpopulated applicants who are all qualified for admission but the institutions lack the capacity to admit them all.
Isma’il Lukman, Mass Communication Department, Bayero University, Kano