On Wednesday, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) admitted a technical error that affected over 300,000 candidates who sat the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) results.
Speaking during a press conference, JAMB Registrar, Is-haq Oloyede, a professor, expressed deep regret over what he described as a disappointing setback in an exercise that had, until the glitch, been considered one of the most successful in recent years.
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“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.
Statistics
Mr Oloyede said the issue affected 157 examination centres across Lagos and the South-East.
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He said the glitch affected 206,610 candidates across 65 centres in Lagos State and 173,387 candidates in 92 centres across South East states.
While 54.37 per cent of candidates affected are in Lagos state, the remaining 45.63 per cent are spread across Anambra, Imo, Abia, Ebonyi, and Enugu states.
Mr Oloyede explained that the glitch was caused by a failed patch meant to update examination servers in the region.
2025 UTME and concerns over low scores
Over 1.9 million candidates sat this year’s UTME, of which 1.5 million—or 78 per cent—scored less than 200 points out of the 400 obtainable points.
However, some candidates protested their low scores, insisting they performed better than their results showed. Other Nigerians on social media also criticised JAMB for what they described as a massive failure.
Mr Oloyede said the UTME statistics are consistent with what has been obtainable over the years. Last year, 76 per cent of candidates who sat the UTME scored less than 200 points.
According to JAMB, in 2022, 1.3 million candidates out of 1.7 million, or 78 per cent, who took the 2022 UTME scored below 200.
In 2021, only 803 candidates out of 1.3 million –or 0.06 per cent– who sat the 2021 UTME scored above 300, the registrar, Mr Oloyede, said at the time.
However, the board invited stakeholders and reviewed the results after widespread concerns.
