THE GUARDIAN, Monday, April 8 2013
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Opinion Still on need to scrap JAMB (1) By Ike Onyechere DUCATION stakeholders have been calling E for the scrapping of Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) to allow tertiary institutions in Nigeria full autonomy to conduct their own admission examinations from start to finish. The harrowing and traumatic experiences some candidates are going through in trying to register for JAMB’s 2013 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) give renewed impetus and urgency to this call. Beyond JAMB’s inefficiencies highlighted by the crises of registration of candidates for 2013 UTME examinations, there are 32 other strong reasons why JAMB should be scrapped. This letter highlights some of the reasons, including inherent social injustice associated with JAMB’s discriminatory practices against and disenfranchisement of some categories of candidates. JAMB’s cumbersome, convoluted and complex UTME and post-UTME processes open up candidates and their parents to extortion rackets to make the cost of seeking admission into institutions of higher learning in Nigeria the most expensive in the world. This leads to capital flight and unprecedented level of negative balance of education trade with other countries as Nigeria becomes a lucrative haven for recruitment of fresh students by institutions from other countries. JAMB by its inefficiency and insensitive responses is increasing the population of angry youths with attendant dangerous and good people of Nigeria. The Nigerian Tribune of Thursday, 14 March, 2013 quoted the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) as saying that “Nigeria has some of the worst education indicators globally.” Even though the report is debatable, it underlines the fact that Nigeria’s education needs surgery rather than palliatives. It makes sense to start by disbanding gate keeping, bottleneck agencies like JAMB. The Nation Newspaper of Thursday, February 28, 2013 (pages 25, 26 and 40) reported how candidates from Lagos, Calabar, Awka, Ibadan, Port Harcourt, Jos, Kano and Lokoja “may miss the 2013 UTME examinations coming up between April 15 and 27 due to no fault of theirs.” The paper told the incredible story of how candidates from Lagos are being sent to centres in Yobe State and candidates from
Calabar are being posted to centres in Uyo while Anambra candidates are being sent to Kebbi, Adamawa and Katsina. Ditto for other states. In its editorial of the same date titled “Traffic JAMB” The Nation Newspaper profiled the consequences of this anomaly: “candidates will be forced to undertake long journeys on Nigeria’s notoriously unsafe roads to strange towns and cities. On arrival, they will lodge in unfamiliar surroundings with all the associated security risks. In spite of the additional and mental stress of extended journeys they will still be expected to write the UTME…” It is a notorious fact that many parents have lost their loved ones as a result of accidents on long journeys to and from UTME and post-UTME examinations. Many female candidates have been sexually harassed in the process. What is happening in JAMB this year is not new. And it will not be the last unless JAMB is scrapped. For the major part of the 2010 examination processes, candidates in Lagos State could not access the JAMB website. Errors and mix-ups associated with allocation of electronic centres were rampant. Candidates from states where JAMB websites could not be accessed had to travel to other states to submit their forms electronically. By 2009, JAMB website was still hosting information relevant only to 2007 examinations. These events were well reported by the media. In her reaction to the reports in Vanguard Newspaper of Thursday October 18, 2007, the then P.R.O of JAMB admitted that “the operations of JAMB like that of other government agencies is not perfect and cannot be perfect.” But JAMB is not just another government agency. The inefficiencies of JAMB affect students and parents and reverberate through the entire tertiary education admission process in Nigeria with tragic consequences. The call by critical education stakeholders for the scrapping of JAMB has been on for some time. The Guardian Newspapers editorial of January 6, 2004 called for “a return to the old practice whereby each university conducts its own admission examinations.” The Nation Newspaper in its editorial of April 7, 2010 wrote, “…The ideal thing is for each institution to conduct its own admission examination…” In its own editorial of June 18, the Punch Newspaper held that “the ultimate solution to the recurring Post-JAMB screening crisis is to scrap JAMB and allow universities
to conduct their own examination.” Other media organisations hold similar views, which reflect popular public opinion. The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) has consistently drawn attention to the fact that “admissions are the responsibility of the Senate of universities anywhere in the world”. Professor Don Baridan, as Vice Chancellor of University of Port Harcourt and Chairman, Committee of Vice Chancellors held that “JAMB is no longer credible. It should simply be scrapped” (The Guardian, June 24, 2010). In an interview with The Nation on Sunday, the Registrar of JAMB dismissed the calls to scrap JAMB on the grounds that “those who call for the scrapping of JAMB never mean well for Nigeria.” (The Nation on Sunday, February 17, 2013, page 25). I beg to disagree with the learned professor that the Nigeria media (who feel and monitor the pulse of public opinion), ASUU, the Committee of Vice Chancellors and millions of other critical education stakeholders in Nigeria “never mean well for Nigeria”. The JAMB decree, promulgated in 1978 by the military government of General Olusegun Obasanjo, was a product of an era when the military had central control of everything: import licenses, banks, telephony, aviation, education, etc. The businesses of banking, telephony, aviation, etc have since been fully deregulated and democratised and Nigeria is better for it. It is time for the education sector to be fully deregulated by scrapping JAMB. It is a policy and legislative wonder that a country will license her universities to conduct first, second, Ph.D and post-doctoral degree examinations while at the same time preventing them from conducting matriculation exams for fresh students. It defies reasoning. Exam Ethics Marshals International estimates the cost of seeking admission into Nigeria’s tertiary institution at N136,000 per candidate on the average. This includes the cost of UTME and post-UTME forms, cost of scratch cards, cost of traveling and hotel accommodations, etc, etc. The convoluted UTME admission process opens parents and students up to all sorts of extortion rackets: payment for citing of scripts and results, payments for change of admission letters, change of course letters, late admission letters. Extortion rackets associated with post-
UTME include payment of fees for: “admission processing”; “accreditation”; “result reconciliation”; “clearance”; “opening of departmental and faculty files” etc. In fact the cost can be as high as N500,000 depending on the course and the institution of choice, example medicine and law. Compare the process and cost of seeking admissions in Nigeria with that of Ghana. To start with, all tertiary institutions in Ghana, including University of Ghana, have 100 per cent autonomy for admitting their students. There is no central admission gatekeeper like JAMB in Ghana. Ghanaian candidates seeking admission into University of Ghana, Legon, for example, pay a total of about 90 Ghana cedis (equivalent of N8,000). Foreign candidates pay a total of US$75.00 (equivalent of N12,000.00). The payment covers all processes including cost of dispatching letters to all applicants through FEDEX courier irrespective of whether or not they are successful. Seeking admissions in Nigeria is 2000 per cent (or 20 times) more expensive than seeking admissions in Ghana. You can confirm this by visiting University of Ghana website http://admission.ug.edu.gh. The suffering and traumatic experiences students are put through by JAMB are no guarantee that they will be admitted even if they scale through the examination with high scores. JAMB standards of assessment are not uniform. There are two standards: a lower standard for Educationally Less Developed States (ELDS) and higher standard for Educationally More Developed States (EMDS). JAMB admissions are allocated based on 45 per cent merit, 35 per cent catchment area/locality and 20 per cent for ELDS. In other words, candidates of ELDS states have a 20 per cent better chance of gaining admissions than EMDS candidates. Their cut off mark are adjusted downwards by at least 20 per cent. The 23 ELDS states, by JAMB categorisation include: Adamawa, Bauchi, Bayelsa, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Ebonyi, Gombe, Jigawa, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kebb, Kogi, Kwara, Nassarawa, Niger, Plateau, Rivers, Sokoto, Taraba, Yobe and Zamfara. Thirteen states and FCT fall under JAMB’s EMDS categories. They include: Abia, Anambra, Akwa Ibom, Delta, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Imo, Lagos, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo and FCT. • To be continued. • Onyechere is founding Chairman, Exam Ethics Marshals International.
Stolen crude: Imperatives for global cooperation By Patrick Cole IL theft featured prominently in discussions at the 2013 O Nigerian Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition, which held in Abuja last week. This is an encouraging sign of evergrowing awareness and debate around the issue, a necessary first step towards agreeing and implementing any lasting solutions. Beyond debate however, the Honourable Minister of Petroleum also disclosed during the conference that the administration has reached out to request the assistance of the international community – President Goodluck Jonathan raised the issue of oil theft in recent visits to the United Kingdom and France with a view to seeking the support of these countries. This is another mark of progress for which congratulations are due to the President and his team. As we have pointed out in our previous articles, though the Nigerian Government must play the lead role in tackling the illegal oil trade it remains an issue that has to be dealt with both locally and internationally. Mutual co-operation and acknowledgement of responsibility will be the key to success. Also arising from the same conference are calls by the International Oil Companies (IOCs) for the Nigerian Government to do more at home. Specifically, the Managing Director of Shell Petroleum Development Company maintained that oil theft is illicit big business, a well organised industry in which the money is controlled by highly placed persons who must be identified and prosecuted if the government means to effectively put an end to oil theft. Indeed the government has previously been criticized for being unwilling to take action against oil theft ‘sponsors’ and it is inferred that the vast resources they control (over $6 billion in national revenue is lost
annually to the illicit trade) enable them to exert a huge influence over government mechanisms meant to combat oil theft. To convince potentially wavering international partners, the Nigerian Government needs to actively demonstrate the political will to deal decisively with the issue at home over and above a willingness to work proactively with the international community to implement long term and sustainable solutions that apply globally. In an earlier article we already stated that collaboration with the international community to end oil theft cuts across various measures that can impact on the illegal trade, from improving maritime security through increased patrolling of international waters in the Gulf of Guinea and capacity building for the Nigerian Navy, to agreeing on sanctions for profitseeking companies or individuals that buy stolen oil and/or refine it to be sold legitimately. To be able to answer the question, “Who are the buyers of stolen crude oil?” the Nigerian Government will also have to ‘track the money’. The administration is already speaking up in favour of what some are calling a Kimberly Process Certification Scheme for crude oil (the concept of blood oil) – the crude oil finger print or chemical tag, which will make it possible to trace where the stolen crude is going. Monitoring and sharing information on the illicit financial transactions attached to oil theft is also key and potentially a much quicker and less complex solution. The cooperation of the international community is needed if the Nigerian Government is going to track the financing of the illegal oil trade or its proceeds because that trail is likely to end up well beyond the shores of Nigeria. Clearly then, international cooperation to address oil theft and identifying and prosecuting illicit financial transactions
tied to the illegal trade are not mutually exclusive measures. The Nigerian Government is on the right track in seeking assistance abroad. However asking for the cooperation of the international community must be matched by doing what is necessary at home to ensure that the collaboration with international partners is effective and yields the desired results. This means everything from allocating the required resources to ensuring the right legal, regulatory and policy frameworks exist within Nigeria to back such collaboration. It also means strengthening existing government mechanisms to combat oil theft and empowering the right institutions. Without a doubt, any investigation of financial transactions overseas requires the cooperation and collaboration of the Nigerian authorities, notably the law enforcement agencies. In fact, such an investigation is normally launched following a request from the local authorities. The leaked report of the Petroleum Revenue Task Force recommended the creation of a special Oil and Gas Sector Financial Crimes Unit for law enforcement. Unless and until such a unit is created however, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission appears to have the key role to play as it is specifically charged with the adoption of measures to identify, trace, freeze, confiscate or seize proceeds derived from economic and financial crimes related offences. The Commission must adequately position itself and be empowered to play its role. Without a recognizable and credible institution at home responsible for tracking illegal oil transactions and working with foreign authorities in that regard, there can be no real talk of investigation overseas. • Dr. Cole, a former Ambassador, is a Consultant to The Guardian Editorial Board.