The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has discovered at least 1,665 counterfeit A-Level results during the 2023 Direct Entry registration exercise.
Professor Is-haq Oloyede, the Registrar, revealed this information while hosting the leaders of the National Association of Nigeria Colleges of Education Students (NANCES) in his office in Abuja on Tuesday.
He stated that the verification process for A-Level results was plagued by systemic corruption.
Of the total number of fake results found, 397 originated from Colleges of Education, 453 were university diplomas, and the remainder were other types of A-Level certificates.
“It should be of grave concern if no one respects the certificate one is holding; hence, there is a need to safeguard the integrity of A-level certificates that are used to secure admission through measures that would stand the test of time,” he said.
The registrar recalled that in the past when a candidate applied for DE, the board would simply ask awarding institutions to do the necessary screening and due diligence.
He stated that JAMB was shocked by the revelations from Bayero University, Kano, where out of the 148 Direct Entry applications to the institution, only six of the certificates forwarded for processing were genuine.
The registrar further stated that it was the discovery of the fraud that prompted the meeting of critical stakeholders, who met to chart ways of combating the menace.
Earlier, the NANCES President, Eegunjobi Samuel, lauded the work the registrar is doing, especially in terms of restoring sanity, integrity, and credibility in the nation’s examination and admission processes.
He said the association was at the JAMB national headquarters to present complaints from their members about the seemingly intractable challenges they are having in the ongoing 2024 DE registration as well as ask for more DE registration centres.