| SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY |
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Prof.
Aaron
Baba,
Special
Advicer
on Technological
Development |
Site Powered by Directorate
of Science &
Technology,
Kogi State |
Updated
November 30, 2008
VOL.
13 No. 747 WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 17 - TUESDAY SEPTEMBER
22, 2008 ISSN 1116 - 7085 N70.00 |
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Admission Hardships for UTME Candidates
Last week, Nigerians, especially students
seeking admission into the country’s
universities and other tertiary
institutions, received with shock the
unpalatable news that over 365,000
candidates, out of the 867,000 that made the
180 admission cut-off points and above in
this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation
Examination (UTME)’ will not be admitted
into any of the tertiary institutions in the
country.
Disclosing the worrisome news at the end of
the first UTME Technical Committee meeting
on Admission, the Registrar of the Joint
Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB)
Professor Dibu Ojerinde, told Nigerian
parents and students that “admission into
tertiary institutions in Nigeria, would be
an issue of survival of the fittest”.
Coming at a time when hopes have started
rising that the introduction of the UTME
might ease the chaotic admission problems
hitherto experienced in the country,
Ojerinde’s disclosure, is most unfortunate,
just as it is worrisome.
This is because, nothing new seems to have
happened as a staggering 366,000 Nigerian
students who have struggled hard to make the
stipulated cut-off marks would have to wait
to write another UMTE next year to get
admission for no fault of theirs but because
“admission is not going to be automatic and
because spaces are not sufficient”.
In his statistical analysis, Ojerinde had
told Nigerians that the combine capacity of
all the Universities, Polytechnics,
Monotechnics and Colleges of Education in
the country is only 527,000.
This, to us, is abysmally low, especially
with over one million candidates seeking
admission every year. The Graphic is worried
that about 366, 000 candidates must wait for
next year to try their luck. It is a bad
development that is capable of endangering
the future of the young minds.
In this period of armed robbery and
kidnapping, leaving the youths jobless and
without admission for a year, can be
disastrous for the country. An idle mind,
they say is the devil’s workshop.
The government has no plan to engage these
youths that are roaming the streets.
Additional 366, 000 youths into the already
congested streets of Nigeria could bring
incalculable consequences.
Over 90 percent of candidates seeking
admission every year prefer public
universities and tertiary institutions,
because it is more affordable. The tuition
fees of the private universities are
obviously prohibitive and out of the reach
of many candidates. Those that have been
denied admission every year as a result of
limited capacity have no alternative than to
wait for another time.
Very few Nigerians can pay the sum of 350,
000 or 400, 000 a session for education in
the private universities. The situation
Ojerinde was actually describing was that of
those seeking admission into public
universities and tertiary institutions.
In as much as we appreciate the liberty of
every candidate to choose the institution of
his choice, there seems to be congestion in
some universities while other universities
are starved.
For example, in the on-going admission
exercise, unimaginable number of candidates
applied to Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU),
University of Lagos and Ahmadu Bello
University, while on the other hand, no
candidate applied to Institute of Management
Training (IMT), Enugu while only 13
candidates applied to the Mohammed Goni
University, Maiduguri.
It is a very sad thing for the development
of education in Nigeria if about 366,000
young men and women are again added to the
existing staggering number of students who
would again be sitting for examination
against the next admission.
It is against this background that The
Graphic seeks the timely intervention of the
Federal Government to address the situation.
A timely action of constructive engagement
could deliver the youths from frustration
and the trauma of seeking admission annually
without success.
The government at all level must find a way
of meaningfully engaging the youths to
reduce the negative effects of joblessness
and inability to secure admission.
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