VCs' defence of post-UTME test

In Nigeria, politics of bitterness and horse-trading happen everywhere. Therefore, when people talk about a class of people in the society being different from others, I often take that with a pinch of salt. Be that as it may, there are certain sectors that should have more pristine and noble values such that they should be above board in such petty and pedestrian tendencies. The exalted class of vice chancellors in the country's universities should be top of this sector.However, if recent reports about the alleged face-off between the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), personified by its Registrar and Chief Executive, Professor 'Dibu Ojerinde, and the Committee of Vice Chancellors over the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), are things to go by, then the country may be said to be hopeless. The two categories, are, to say the least, quite strategic for the growth and development of the country; while the former is responsible for the conduct ofmatriculation examination into the tertiary institutions, the latter oversees the universities to ensure that good products are turned out of the universities.The genesis of the problem, it should be noted, had to do with Professor Ojerinde's stance ' which is the popular position ' about the post-UTME, which universities now conduct for candidates who have scaled the hurdles of JAMB, subjecting students and parents, again, to several pressure ranging from financial to physical.Professor Ojerinde, being the head of JAMB and by extension the defender of the Act establishing it, had stated several times and recently before the Senate Committee on Education that post-UTME negates the Act that established JAMB, saying the former had assumed an equal standard with JAMB, while pointing out the illegalities of the post-UTME being conducted by institutions, even as he noted how universities flay the N1000 directive. This writer, like thousands of Nigerians, is with Professor Ojerinde on this, as universities have now become like the Nigerian policemen, extorting money from innocent candidates in a bite-more-than-you-can-chew manner.The Vice Chancellors, being the head of universities, know how many candidates they can admit per session but the new money-spinning venture, post-UTME, is conducted in a manner that they invite thousands and collect thousands from them only to pick a paltry few, and that is one of the arguments of Professor Ojerinde, which the House of Representatives had also at one time debated.However, the Vice Chancellors have also on several occasions and collectively pointed out the reasons behind the conduct of post-UTME, citing the deteriorating standard of education and the various dubious means which they said students have devised to pass the UTME organised by JAMB. The arguments are tenable but may not subsist in the face of a superior argument, which is the fact that the money they collect from candidates sitting for post-UTME seems to outweigh all other reasons they may adduce.Professor Ojerinde, though once one of them, and in fact millions of Nigerians, would not be swerved by the VCs defence, probably because they do not see things from the standpoint of universities' chiefs whose mandate it is to generate funds and had seen post-UTME as the goose that can lay the golden eggs. That, I think is the beginning of a battle that may cause serious setback to the nation's educational sector.Sensing that the JAMB top shot was out to 'spoil' their blossoming post-UTME business, the VCs in what can only be described as a reactionary move, have now launched an attack against UTME. According to media reports last week, the chairman of the Committee of Vice Chancellors and the Vice Chancellor of the University of Ilorin, Professor Ishaq Oloyede, was quoted to have told the Senate Committee on Education that it was wrong that the same examination was being used to admit students into all tertiary institutions. The questions which the Senate Committee and in fact all Nigerians should ask the VCs are; where were they when the UTME was introduced and what was their reactions' If UTME had been as bad as they are now making it look, why did universities suddenly change the name of the tests to post-UTME and not simply stand their grounds about the now perceived inappropriateness of UTME'The answers to the questions are quite simple; had nobody criticised post-UTME, a device of the VCs, the honourable Vice Chancellors would not have spoken against UTME, which is a brainchild of the current JAMB Registrar. This politics of 'a hen upturns my medicine and I will break its egg' will have a dangerous effect on the country's already weak education sector which may be further weakened.Professor Ojerinde, the chief executive of JAMB must have made his observation about post-UTME in good faith, which is what any of the VCs would have done if they were in his shoes. He must also have conducted the feasibility studies on Post-UTME, which is only in its second year. It is therefore expedient that stakeholders in the country's educational sector watch what they do or else the country will go the usual way of policy somersaults, which has been the bane of the sector for decades.In my layman's view, there is nothing wrong with UTME if it can deliver the good. More so, it is a great way to cut waste in the organisation of examinations in the country, and the resources can be channeled to other sources. Therefore, the Vice Chancellors should as a matter of urgency, back their misgivings about a single matriculation examination for all tertiary institutions with solid facts and allow Professor Ojerinde, an expert in education measurement, to also defend UTME, rather than just launching a sentimental attack because of post-UTME, which more Nigerians would see perish than subsist.Ndubuisi, a public affairs analyst writes from Lagos.
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