Yesterday, 7th August, 2008, students who applied for admissions into year one of the University of Maiduguri has been plunged into unsolicited hardship as the University which is the only one in the North-Eastern part of Nigeria covering Borno, Adamawa, Yobe, Bauchi, Gombe and Taraba States offering most courses at undergraduate level, announced that it is going to conduct a screening exercise of all candidates who applied their first choices to UNIMAID.
Propspective students from all walks of life have been trooping into the capital city of Borno State to the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board office along GRA to purchase a scracth card that will enable them browse and print their originals of the JAMB result, as required by the screening committee of the University.
Most of the prospective students who stood stranded due to the fact that they could not obtained the scracth card as the one supplied tot he State is too small. Other prospective students had to call their friends and families in other sister states to purchase the cards and text to them the details to enable them print their originals of the JAMB result.
Mohammed Bukar Kolo, a prospective student when asked if he has been able to print out his result replied in the negative and lamented that the officials of the JAMB office are not helping matters because they have closed down their gate entrance and dont want to attend to any prospective students.
Many stakeholders have faulted the introduction of the Post UME Screening as being insensitive to the plight of the ordinary Nigerian, especially at this critical economic period, as every individual is expected to pay the sum of N2,000.00 administrative charges before he is screened.
In 2007, same screening of UME prospective candidates was conducted without any tangible meaning, as prospects who have not even been screened were largely admitted into the university. If that is the case, what is the reason behind the introduction of the post UME screening of students?
So many prospective students who can not afford the Post UME screening money within a short time will be automatically exempted from being admitted into the university. This act of the University authority is seen as a deliberate attempt to sabotage the effort of the prospective students in gaining admission putting into consideration the State is listed among those who are educationally less privilege in Nigeria.
The University authority should as a matter of urgency reverse this trend to its status quo. The JAMB is the only gateway to Nigerian Universities and should be allowed to be so without any other screening exercise by the university which might deprive many candidates from admission.
