SaharaReporters had reported that Mmesoma Ejikeme, a student of Girls Anglican Secondary School, Nnewi, Anambra state was accused of fraudulently inflating her UTME result from 249 to 362.
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board says there is internal evidence to show that the change in Mmesoma Ejikeme's scores in the 2023 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) was done with her collaboration.
SaharaReporters had reported that Mmesoma Ejikeme, a student of Girls Anglican Secondary School, Nnewi, Anambra state was accused of fraudulently inflating her UTME result from 249 to 362.
The JAMB management on Sunday described her result as fake and on Tuesday, barred Mmesoma for three years from sitting the examination.
However, speaking to The PUNCH, the JAMB Registrar Prof. Ishaq Oloyede said the Board had concluded its internal investigation into the case of Ejikeme's result.
Oloyede said, “The truth is that JAMB has concluded the investigation on Nmesoma’s score falsification matter. She was not the only one caught, just that others have chosen not to go out.
“Presently, there is an industry faking results and unfortunately, they cannot penetrate JAMB system, reasons being that (our) system is foolproofed and we will prove it any time.
“It is unfortunate that parents and some of the candidates that are being fooled are not aware that they are only being fooled.
“There is internal evidence to show that the change in Ejikeme’s scores was done with her collaboration. There are certain features pertaining to her that only her knows unless she makes it available to somebody else. They couldn’t have increased her scores on her behalf.”
Oloyede said he earlier had a conversation with former education minister Oby Ezekwesili on Nmesoma’s matter.
According to the JAMB Register, he told Ezekwesili that the scam was of high-level.
“We improved on our facilities this year, so Ejikeme and her collaborators are still living in the past. I spoke with Mrs Ezekwesili on the matter and I told her that it is a high-level scam and I told her that it was a careless forgery.
“This is because we are no longer using some of the things they used in changing those results since 2021.
“We used that pattern in 2021 and you saw what happened and many of such individuals were caught as well and they were treated accordingly,” he stated.