The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), University of Nigeria Nsukka (UNN) branch, has threatened to sue the Joint Matriculation Board (JAMB) over the massive failure recorded in the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Exam (UTME).
The Chairman of ASUU-UNN, Comrade Óyibo Eze, made the disclosure while briefing newsmen in Nsukka on Wednesday.
Oyibo said the massive failure, which mostly affected candidates from the South East, was a deliberate attempt by JAMB to stop children from the zone from getting admission.
“My office has been inundated with protests, calls and visits by parents and the general public on this deliberate massive failure in the 2025 JAMB examination.
“ASUU will challenge this result in the High Court if JAMB fails to review the result and give candidates their merited scores .
“JAMB knows that children from the South East must score higher before they can get admission, whereas their counterparts in some parts of the country will use a 120 JAMB score to get admission to read medicine at universities in their area.
“In the JAMB recently released result, out of 1,955,069 candidates who sat for the 2025 examination, over 1.5 million candidates scored less than 200, and the majority of these are from the South East and Lagos State, where many Igbos reside,” he said.
He called on governors from the South East to rise up and challenge this injustice targeted towards preventing children from the zone from gaining admission into higher institutions in the country.
“The governors in the zone should not sit and watch JAMB toy with the academic future of our children.
” I am not against the board punishing those found guilty of exam malpractice, but JAMB should not, because of these few candidates, fail the whole candidates in an exam centre,” he said.
The ASUU boss said that it was unbelievable and unacceptable that in the whole University Secondary School, Nsukka, no candidate that sat for the exam scored up to 200 in the UTME.
“This school has superlative students who have excelled in academics both inside and outside the school; how come all of them scored less than 200 in the exam?
“Even if JAMB discovered one or two candidates for exam malpractice, is that enough reason to fail all others who have prepared very hard for that exam?” he said.
Oyibo advised JAMB to act fast to do the needful by reviewing the result, as that massive failure had become a national issue which might attract national protest if nothing urgent was done.
Meanwhile the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has finally admitted that it made errors that affected students’ performance during the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination.
The Registrar, Prof Ishaq Oloyede, who addressed a press conference in response to public outcry that followed the development, tendered an unreserved apology to candidates affected.
“I understand that there are three powerful expressions which contain one word, two words and three words respectively. They are please, thank you and I am sorry. So, I appeal to the candidates and those affected by the error of our system to accept this explanation as the truth of the matter without embellishment. Please, I apologise and take full responsibility not just in words,” he said.
To this end, he announced that a total of 379,997 candidates, cutting across six states of the federation, would retake the examination from Friday May 16 to 18.
The affected states, according to Oloyede are five in the South East zone and Lagos in the South West. Specifically, they are Lagos, Imo, Anambra, Oyo, Abia and Ebonyi.
Oloyede, who held back tears while admitting responsibility for the ugly development, blamed the negligence of some JAMB staff, adding that candidates in 65 centres in Lagos and 92 in Owerri Zone, covering the five states in the South East, would rewrite the exam.
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