Reps urge JAMB to stay punitive action against Ejikeme

The House of Representatives has urged the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) to stay any punitive actions against Miss Joy Mmesoma Ejikeme over alleged falsification of her JAMB score.

This followed the adoption of a motion by Rep. Awaji-Inombek Abiante (PDP-Bayelsa) at plenary in Abuja on Wednesday.

Recall that Ejikeme had claimed to have scored 362 as against 249 which the board recorded as her score in the 2023 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examinations (UTME) through JAMB.

He said Ejikeme, a student of Anglican Girls Secondary School, Nnewi, Anambra, sat for the 2023 UTME and claimed to have scored 362.

Abiante said on July 2, JAMB Head of Public Affairs and Protocol, Dr Fabian Benjamin n a statement, accused Ejikeme of manipulating her UTME score from 249 to 362.

He said Ejikeme came out to defend herself, that she actually printed the result from the JAMB website and had been a brilliant child all through her nursery and secondary education.

He said Mmesoma came first in all the examinations she had been taking before the UTME, hence she posited that she was not capable of manipulating her UTME result.

According to him, cognisant of the fact that uploading or downloading result of examinations or polls electronically, in Nigeria, glitches can occur at any time, hence the need to establish the facts before any blames.

He said Benjamin had earlier alleged that some of the 2023 UTME candidates were parading fake scores in order to get undue advantage from the public, hence the need to investigate the allegation.

The house, therefore, set up an ad hoc committee to investigate the alleged manipulation of Ejikeme’s UTME results and report back within one week for further legislative action.