JAMB Registrar Prof. Oloyede Considered Resignation After 2025 UTME Glitch Affected Over 370,000 Candidates

The Registrar of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Professor Ishaq Oloyede, has disclosed that he considered resigning after a major technical failure disrupted the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), impacting hundreds of thousands of candidates.

Speaking on Wednesday during a stakeholders’ meeting in Abuja with civil society groups, tertiary education representatives, and chief external examiners, Oloyede admitted that the nationwide backlash and accusations of sabotage and ethnic bias shook him deeply.

“When it happened, my first reaction was to resign. But people advised me that the students will never forgive me because it would look like I abandoned them at such a time,” the JAMB boss revealed.

The UTME technical error, which led to scores being inaccurately recorded or lost, triggered widespread criticism. Over 78% of candidates scored below 200 out of 400, sparking national concern over examination integrity and fairness.

According to Oloyede, an internal investigation showed that a technical service provider’s server update caused a system failure, preventing candidate responses from being uploaded during the first three days of the examination.

The error went unnoticed until after the release of results on May 9, affecting 379,997 candidates across 157 centers, mostly in Lagos and the South-East.

“The candidates’ responses were not uploaded due to a server update fault that escaped early detection,” he said.

To address the crisis, JAMB promptly organized a resit examination for the affected candidates from May 16 to May 19, 2025.

The Board has since reaffirmed its commitment to improving technical safeguards and ensuring examination credibility in future assessments.