The Registrar of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Is-haq Oloyede, says investigations conducted by his agency into the controversies surrounding the alleged fake result being claimed by Ejikeme Mmesoma, a candidate who sat the 2023 examination, revealed that she “was either duped or she is a member of a high-level syndicate engaging in manufacturing fake UTME results.”
Recalled that Miss Mmsesoma, a female indigene of Enugu State, residing in Nnewi, Anambra State, and attends Anglican Girls Secondary School (AGSS) Nnewi, claimed she scored 362 in the the 2023 UTME examination.
According to her, she scored 98 in English Language, 89 in Physics, 94 in Biology and 81 in Chemistry, totalling 362 of the 400 obtainable marks.
The ‘feat’ had earned her accolades from many Nigerians, including the government of Anambra State and the founder of Innoson Vehicles, Innocent Chukwuma, who promised her a N3 million scholarship.
But speaking exclusively to PREMIUM TIMES on the controversies surrounding the issue on Monday, Mr Oloyede, insisted that the document being displayed by Miss Mmesoma “belongs to another candidate who sat the examination two years ago.”
He said: “If you scan the code, the candidate’s result will show. So I can say emphatically that the girl is parading a fake result. It is either she is being duped, or she is part of a syndicate manufacturing purported JAMB results.
“There are security features on our results, so I can emphasise that the girl is just trying to deceive the public. Her result is completely fake. Her claim that she printed the result from our site is a lie, totally incorrect. If we should reveal all that we know, people will be shocked. So if people are looking for shortcuts to achieve an end, that is what would happen.”
While stating that the agency’s system was not hacked, Mr Oloyede insisted that result being carried about by Miss Mmesoma did not emanate from JAMB’s system.
“The result she is holding is completely fake because we are able to track everything printed from our system,” JAMB’s registrar stated.
Meanwhile, the candidate in a video circulating on social media platforms on Monday, the candidate insisted that the document showing her purported 362 was printed from the JAMB website, claiming it is authentic.
Mmesoma said, “I am the owner of this result. I went to the JAMB portal to print this result. And this is what they gave me. This is exactly how I downloaded it from that site.”
“So, they, now saying that I forged my result is what I don’t know. I am traumatised that they accused me of forging my own result.”
Holding the the result sheet, Miss Mmesoma narrated in the video that she had, accompanied by her school principal, presented the result to the Commissioner for Education in Anambra State, Ngozi Chuma-Udeh, a professor, who snapped and sent the result to the JAMB officials. But the JAMB officials said the result was forged.
“We went to the commissioner of education office on Friday with my principal. We went there; we showed all these results to the commissioner of education. Both this one and the SMS they sent to me. She snapped it and sent it to the JAMB official. They called back saying this is a forged result, that I forged it myself, and that the JAMB office doesn’t have a record of this.”
Afterwards, she said, some State Security Service (SSS, also called DSS) officials took them from the commissioner’s office to the SSS office, where the SSS officials promised to investigate the origin of the result. But before they received any information from the SSS, JAMB had released a statement accusing her of manipulating the result, she said.
“They called the DSS over to come to her office. The DSS took us to their office. And we made our statement there, and they said they’ll contact us later, that they’ll investigate the result to know where it came from,” she continued.
“Instead of them to wait for the investigation to be over, they posted that I forged my result without confirmation. So I am really sad about this.”
Miss Mmesoma went further to say she had always been a brilliant student and the best in her classes from nursery school.
Shedding more light on the manufacturing of fake results, JAMB registrar said there are various syndicates engaging in the act.
According to Oloyede: “Some of them even tried to call me to record my voice so they can clone it, to prove that I already confirmed the girl’s result as authentic. They didn’t know that I was already aware of their game. It is a high-level involvement with many people. It is a complete scam, and we have handed over the girl to the security operatives, but she is on bail.”
