Regina Otokpa, Abuja
The Registrar, Joint Admissions And Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, has said the use of the National Identity Number (NIN) as a mandatory prerequisite for the 2021 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) registration, was primarily to checkmate examination malpractices and aid national security.
Oloyede, who made this known on Friday in Abuja during a virtual meeting held with CBT owners, zonal directors, zone coordinators, telecommunication service providers and technical advisers nationwide, said the directive was issued by the Minister of Education.
While noting that identification was key to sanitising the system, he warned that no JAMB accredited CBT centre was allowed to serve as NIN enrollment agent with NIMC for the period of UTME registration and examinations.
He 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.
“Its 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 this problems we have is because we have 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 in to 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.”