A final audit of the results of the 379,775 candidates who say the rescheduled 2025 Unified Tertiary and Matriculation Examination is being conducted ahead of the final release to the public on Thursday, The PUNCH reports.
The audit team includes officials from the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, Civil Societies Organisations, academics and other independent observers.
A source, who did not want to be named for lack of authorisation, disclosed the development to our correspondent after the press briefing which announced the completion of the resit.
JAMB spokesman, Dr Fabian Benjamin, had on Monday told The PUNCH that the results of the resit UTME would be released on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Findngs my our correspondent on Wednesday, however, revealed that the results were being audited, hence, the reason they were not released on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, JAMB, on Wednesday, announced a fresh round of mop-up examinations to accommodate the over 5.6 per cent of candidates who missed the just-concluded 2025 UTME.
JAMB Registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, said the initiative would cover all affected candidates\u2014regardless of the reason for their absence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis time, we are creating a new mop-up. Even those who missed the earlier exam due to absence will get another opportunity,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not extraordinary. In any serious system, when students miss an exam, they\u2019re allowed to make up\u2014provided there\u2019s no abuse.\u201d
Oloyede emphasised that the UTME is a placement test, not a measure of intelligence or academic potential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIts purpose is to rank candidates for limited admission slots, not to test how smart someone is,\u201d he clarified.
Addressing growing criticism and conspiracy theories about the examination process, Oloyede firmly rejected claims of ethnic bias or administrative incompetence.
\u201cI take responsibility, not because I failed, but because that\u2019s leadership,\u201d he stated. \u201cI didn\u2019t even realise people viewed issues around me through ethnic lenses. We must rise above such profiling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He praised both candidates and staff for their resilience amid logistical difficulties. \u201cWe had limited space. We knew if we wasted more time grieving the challenges, students would lose their opportunity,\u201d he said.
The special mop-up exam will be scheduled soon, and JAMB says it remains committed to transparency and fairness in admissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
S\u2019West Reps back Oloyede<\/strong> Oloyede publicly accepted responsibility for the issue, tearfully apologising to the affected candidates and their parents last week, and promising to take steps to prevent a recurrence of such errors. The lawmakers argued that most of those impacted by the technical glitch come from the South-East geopolitical zone. These factors, they claim, have caused undue distress for students and their families. They added:\u201cWhile we appreciate Prof. Oloyede\u2019s openness in admitting JAMB\u2019s failures, the remedial steps taken so far fall drastically short of our constituents\u2019 expectations. Oluwole Oke, a five-time House member representing Oriade\/Obokun Federal Constituency, told The PUNCH exclusively that the JAMB Registrar is \u201cjust too clean\u201d to deliberately orchestrate such a glitch that now threatens his position. \u201cYes, something went wrong under his leadership, but he admitted the mistake and apologized publicly. What else do we want from him?\u201d Raji said:\u201cThe incident was unfortunate, but it affected the Lagos zone more than the South-East. The Registrar of JAMB, however, did the uncommon in Nigerian public service by openly admitting the mistake, tendering a heartfelt apology, and arranging for affected students to retake the exam. Attempts to get a reaction from the Chairman of the South-West Caucus in the House, James Faleke, were unsuccessful as he did not answer calls or respond to WhatsApp messages.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A final audit of the results of the 379,775 candidates who say the rescheduled 2025 Unified Tertiary and Matriculation Examination is being conducted ahead of the final release to the public on Thursday, The PUNCH reports. The audit team includes officials from the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, Civil Societies Organisations, academics and other independent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":13780,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-naija-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.funminews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/IMG_2283-2.jpg?fit=290%2C174&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13781"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13782,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13781\/revisions\/13782"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.funminews.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Meanwhile, members of the House of Representatives from the South-West have countered the damand for JAMB registrar\u2019s resignation by the South-East caucus.
The 2025 UTME exercise was seriously affected by a technical failure, which prevented approximately 379,000 candidates from completing the exam, putting their aspirations for higher education at risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite this, the South-East caucus in the House, in a statement signed by Iduma Igariwey (PDP, Ebonyi), demanded Oloyede\u2019s resignation, describing the situation as a \u201ccatastrophic institutional failure\u201d by JAMB.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They criticised the board\u2019s response as inadequate, citing poor communication, scheduling conflicts with ongoing WAEC examinations, and insufficient notice given for the resit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAs a caucus, we are deeply concerned as all five South-Eastern states we represent were directly affected by these \u2018score distortions.\u2019\u201d
The caucus demanded the suspension of key officials responsible for JAMB\u2019s digital operations and logistics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, some notable lawmakers from the South-West have rejected the South-East caucus\u2019s call for Oloyede\u2019s resignation, describing it as excessive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said: \u201cThe call for resignation is very mischievous. Prof. Oloyede is one of Nigeria\u2019s most transparent and upright public servants. As chairman of the House Public Accounts Committee, I investigated JAMB operations and can attest that Prof. Oloyede is beyond reproach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Oke\u2019s stance was echoed by his Lagos counterpart, Wale Raji, who wondered why the South-East lawmakers are calling for the JAMB Registrar\u2019s head when many students in Lagos State were equally affected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWith this, Prof. Oloyede has set a standard for public officials in similar situations to follow. The call by the South-East is uncalled for and condemnable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n