THE Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), on Friday, said it made the National Identification Number mandatory for the 2021 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination registration for security reasons.
Registrar of JAMB, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, gave the explanation in Abuja during a virtual meeting with owners of Computer Based Test Centres, service providers and other stakeholders, to kickstart the 2021 UTME registration.
He noted that the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, had ordered the use of NIN as a prerequisite for registration.
Oloyede said, “We don’t even require the name of the candidate. We just want the NIN. We will then do the needful to pull the data of the candidate and the process will go on from there.
“It is for security reasons; for us, at our small level, it helps us to avoid impersonation but there is a bigger picture of insecurity in the country and we know that many of these problems we have are caused by identification problem. We cannot identify every citizen, where he is and what he is doing.”
“Government is trying to ensure that we have some strategy for improving the security system and of course, if those who are coming into the tertiary institution are exposed to this basic civil responsibility, it will be good to develop a culture of accountability because accountability starts from being identified,” he added.
He said candidates must make use of accessible SIM cards, which had never been used for UTME registration, adding that talks were ongoing with the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy to grant a conditioned waiver to an estimated 20 per cent of candidates without SIM cards.
Oloyede stated, “We have told the National Communication Commission (NCC) and approached the Minister of Communication and Digital Economy and we are hopeful that we will be granted waiver, with, of course, conditionalities, which we must ensure the candidates meet.
“Not all the candidates are without SIM. 80 per cent of the candidates already have their numbers. We are talking of the 20 per cent and if we are fortunate enough to secure the waiver of the minister through the NCC. We will go ahead to make sure there is full compliance to the conditionalities because it is in our interest as a nation that those things that are put in place should be allowed to protect all of us.”
He, however, said no CBT was allowed to act as an agent of NIMC for NIN enrolment.
“No JAMB accredited CBT centre is allowed as agent of NIMC in the enrollment of NIN,” Oloyede said.
