ASUU condemns JAMB cut-off mark for admission

The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Vice-Chancellor of University of Ibadan have rejected the decision of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board

(JAMB) to reduce admission cut-off mark to 120 for universities and 100 for polytechnics and colleges of education.

ASUU has described the action as an absurd policy decision which is line with the intention of the present government to destroy public universities in the country.

Most of the vice-chancellors Punch correspondents interviewed maintained that they would not bring down admission standards in their respective varsities, stating that the decision would not add value to the nation’s university system.

The Vice-Chancellor, University of Ibadan, Prof. Idowu Olayinka, on the issue on Thursday in a statement said the Premier University would never admit any candidate that scored 120 in the UTME.

The statement read, “It should worry us as patriots that candidates who scored just 30 per cent in the UTME can be admitted into some of our universities. Yet, we complain of poor quality of our graduates. You can hardly build something on nothing. The consolation here is that since JAMB started conducting this qualifying exam in 1978, University of Ibadan has never admitted any candidate who scored less than 200 marks out of the maximum 400 marks.

“This translates to a minimum of 50 per cent. This remains our position as an institution aspiring to be world-class. Reality is that only about four other universities in the country have such high standard. To that extent, apart from being the oldest, we are an elite university in the country at least judging by the quality of our intakes.’’

Prof. Olayinka, however, commended the decision of the Federal Government to re-introduce the post-UTME test and exonerated the incumbent JAMB Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, from the cancellation of the test two sessions ago.

“It is gratifying to note that the Honourable Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, who chaired the meeting, apologised publicly for canceling the post-UTME screening last year.

“In effect, universities are now allowed to conduct the test using modalities approved by the Senate of each institution.