The Joint Admission and Matriculation Board, JAMB, Monday, released 1.3 million results of the just-concluded 2018 UTME with the emergence of the best candidate scoring 344.
Dr Fabian Benjamin, JAMB’s spokesman, who made this known on Sunday, during an interview with newsmen in Abuja, said that the board wanted to ensure all results are screened before they are released.
“We are presently viewing the CCTV to ensure that results are not released in several batches. These are the results of the CBT centres that have been screened. We cannot say how many cases of malpractice we have yet because we are still viewing the CCTV to discover more cases.
The JAMB spokesman also said that the examination body found out CBT owners who collect money from candidates.
“Some strange findings that the CCTV has shown us include a situation where the CBT owners were collecting money from UTME candidates and seeing to how they could assist them. Our officials at the centres raised the alarm but they were also afraid so that their lives would not be endangered.
“What the JAMB officials did was to silently play along with them, but we were watching everything on the CCTV. We later sent operatives to the centres and caught them. Such UTME results were completely cancelled. We knew that there were some innocent candidates in such centres and we have asked them to go to other CBT centres and rewrite immediately.”
Recall that few days to the end of the 2018 UTME, Prof Ishaq Oloyede, JAMB Registrar, condemned parents who encourage their children to engage in examination malpractices.
Oloyede said parents should dissociate themselves from such ”shameful acts.”
Meanwhile, another candidate, Ibukun Oduntan, has emerged ‘best candidate’ in the just concluded 2018 UTME with 344 score.
On Thursday, March 15, Aliyu Muhammad Sani Kaugama, a young boy from Jigawa state who scored 311, was celebrated on Facebook for purportedly emerging as the best candidate in the 2018 UTME.
However, in the first batch of results JAMB released on Monday, March 19, 2018, Ibukun Oduntan, who finished her secondary school education from Corona Secondary school, Agbara, Ogun State reportedly scored 344 in the examination.
According to Daily Post, one Olaitan Anifowoshe, a staff of Corona Secondary school, said that Oduntan’s score remains the highest so far in the released results.
He said, ”I would like to call your attention to the scores achieved by Corona Secondary School (CSS), Agbara, Ogun state.
”The highest score from CSS, Ibukun Oduntan is 344. Our top 4 scores are above 320. Our Top 10 scores are above 300.”
So far, Oduntan’s UTME score is believed to be the highest.
According to the information on the school website, the 2018 UTME has been said to e a success for Corona Secondary School as the students’ average score in the exam is 272.