Oloyede, who spoke before the House Committee on Finance on Wednesday, said the examination body does not have to be catered for in the annual budget if it is allowed to hike up the cost of UTME from N3,500 to N5,000, an increase of about 40 percent.
Ishaq Oloyede, the Registrar of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, has revealed that Nigerians should be made to pay more for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination in exchange for financial autonomy for the board.
Oloyede, who spoke before the House Committee on Finance on Wednesday, said the examination body does not have to be catered for in the annual budget if it is allowed to hike up the cost of UTME from N3,500 to N5,000, an increase of about 40 percent.
The registrar said the cost was reduced in 2017 as JAMB is not a revenue-generating entity.
He, however, noted that with the current inflation rate and other economic realities, the matter needs to be reviewed.
Oloyede described the proposed increment as insignificant, but that it will allow the body to be fully independent.
“We cancelled some centres because we heard that some parents paid N200,000 per child. There was a time we opened a platform for upgrades, and a lot of people paid.
“I believe we should revert to the N5000 we were charging. Given the inflation, if we charge N10,000– I am just giving it as an example, nobody will ask the federal government for one kobo. I am not aware of anywhere in the world, except maybe Finland— that charges as low as JAMB is charging. In Finland, we know that everything is free,” he said.
Oloyede, however, argued that JAMB is content with the current arrangement but described the option as viable to free some funds for the cash-strapped Nigerian government.
The examination body has remitted N27.2 billion to the Nigerian government’s coffers from 2017 to date.
Oloyede while giving a breakdown of remittances, in Abuja, said a total of N9.7 billion was used for capital projects in the same period.
He said that N7.8 billion, N5.2 billion, N3.76 billion, N4 billion, N3.5 billion and N3 billion were remitted in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 respectively.
Oloyede, who was represented by JAMB’s Director, Legal Services, Abdul Wahab Oyedokun, said the Board has taken several measures to ensure total sanity in its examination processes.
While listing some of the measures to include the deployment of sophisticated biometric technology to curb multiple registrations in UTME, Oloyede said the Board has taken another major step to put an end to the use of fake A Level certificates to secure admission.
Meanwhile, the suspension of admissions in Nigerian universities has led to the failure of the universities to process a total of 461,745 admissions.
JAMB blamed the seven-month-old strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities for the development.
Strike actions by university-based unions such as ASUU, Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities; Non-Academic Staff Union of Universities and other allied institutions have continued to cripple academic activities in federal and state universities.