JAMB Resumes Nationwide 2023 Direct Entry Registration with New Guidelines

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has announced that the 2023 Direct Entry registration has resumed nationwide. This announcement was made by the Registrar of JAMB, Professor Is-haq Oloyede, during a press briefing in Abuja on Monday. The registration for Direct Entry is expected to close on April 28, 2023.

However, Professor Oloyede expressed concern about the high level of forgery of A Level certificates used for the registration. He lamented the plethora of devices and machinations employed by some candidates to circumvent and compromise the standard of A’ Level qualifications required from Direct Entry candidates. The JAMB Registrar emphasized that such acts would no longer be tolerated, and new guidelines have been introduced to check them.

According to him, the Federal Ministry of Education and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission have jointly conducted operations on DE qualifications, which brought to light some of these unsavory and nefarious activities. Bayero University, Kano, has also consistently brought to the fore the high rate of forgery of A’ Level qualifications for Direct Entry. For instance, out of 148 candidates verified by BUK, only six were found to be genuine. By implication, 142 of the results were forged.

The Board and other stakeholders are working assiduously to detect such acts, and the ones already found are being dealt with according to the provisions of the law. Hence, the JAMB Registrar announced that the Board would only accept 13 qualifications/certificates for the 2023 Direct Entry registration, which include first degree, university diploma, Higher National Diploma, Ordinary National Diploma /National Diploma, Nigeria Certificate in Education, Interim Joint Matriculation Board A’ Level, Joint Universities Preliminary Examination Board A’ Level, NABTEB Advanced National Business Certificate, NABTEB Advanced National Technical Certificate, NABTEB GCE-A’ Level (2015 – 2021), Higher Islamic Studies Certificate by NBAIS, International Baccalaureate, and the National Registered Nurse /National Registered Midwife.

Meanwhile, the 127 candidates who had earlier registered for the 2023 Direct Entry before the exercise was suspended would be requested to return to the registration centres and update their application.

Furthermore, the data bank put in place to address challenges associated with the A’ Level qualifications has now been renamed as ‘Nigeria Post-secondary Education Data System’.

On the 2023 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, Professor Oloyede said JAMB had introduced new measures in the conduct of the exam and called for understanding. He noted that no examination would be allowed to take place after one hour of its scheduled start time because some of the problems reported at the centers are contrived to delay the commencement of a session in some centers with a view to securing undue advantage for the delayed candidates.

Therefore, any session that could not take off within one hour of its schedule would be automatically rescheduled. Affected candidates are expected to file out of the examination hall into the waiting hall and await the new scheduled time and place, which most likely would be the same or the following day.

In conclusion, the resumption of the 2023 Direct Entry registration by JAMB is a welcome development for candidates who are interested in furthering their education through Direct Entry. However, it is crucial to note that the Board has introduced new guidelines to check the high level of forgery of A Level certificates. Candidates are advised to ensure that they possess genuine and acceptable qualifications/certificates to avoid any form of sanctions.