The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has clarified that the process of admission requires candidates to upload their O’Level results on the Central Admissions Processing System (CAPS) platform, among others, to determine their eligibility for tertiary education.

The Board said it has also begun an investigation into claims in a report by an online medium that the University of Lagos (UNILAG) reportedly denied over 2,000 applicants admission over the failure of JAMB to upload their O’Level results on CAPS, stressing, however, that it is candidates and not JAMB that uploads results.

Head of Public Affairs and Protocol of JAMB, Dr Fabian Benjamin, said in a statement on Friday in Abuja that the Board would want to state clearly that its Central Admissions Processing System (CAPS), a platform on which all admissions are conducted and through which candidates are expected to upload their O/level results, was established to engender transparency and accountability in the admission process.

According to him, resolving candidates’ complaints concerning their admission status is a major component of the software, which was introduced to ensure that no candidate is denied admission unjustly.

He added that one of the major provisions of the platform and others like the ticketing platform is their capacity to empower candidates to interact directly with the board with a meticulous record of such interactions archived and generate an electronic trail that all operators could access to ascertain the true position of things should any dispute arise.

“As a regulator, one of the central responsibilities of the Board to candidates and other stakeholders is to ensure that no candidate who is qualified to be admitted is denied such admission, hence the several provisions by the Board for candidates to always raise queries when they feel shortchanged.

“It is noteworthy that the process of admission requires candidates to upload their O’Level results on the CAPS platform, among others, to determine their eligibility for tertiary education.

“To ensure wider access, candidates are, at the point of registration, allowed to register with “Awaiting Result,” but such results being awaited must be uploaded before the commencement of admission by their chosen institution; otherwise, they would be deemed unqualified.

“Candidates who upload their O’Level results after the stipulated time for consideration of admission stand no chance, even when they eventually upload such results or petition their choice institutions.

“However, no candidate should be left out if he or she uploads within the stipulated time and is ranked amongst qualified candidates in any particular course of study,” Benjamin said.

He added that, “To facilitate this, the CAPS tracking facility indicates the date, time, and even seconds that such results were uploaded and, as such, provides incontrovertible evidence in the event of disputes.

“Before this publication, some candidates, through the ‘Ticketing Platform’ of the Board, queried their failure to get admitted, positing that by virtue of their ranking on the platform, they ought to be admitted,” he stated.

Benjamin disclosed that their claims were being investigated to ascertain their veracity, with such universities being engaged to arrive at a just and equitable outcome, saying that at the end of the investigations, the Board believed that justice would be seen to have been done.

Part of the statement read: “The Board, as a responsible and responsive agency, has, over the years, ensured that institutions admit candidates even where they felt strongly that such candidates did not deserve such admission based on certain principles that the Board felt had not been sufficiently or clearly defined ab initio.

“The Board assures all of fairness and equity in resolving this procedural issue with the University of Lagos, even as we maintain that had the CAPS platform not been efficient, it would have been difficult for the students concerned to know their ranking or standing on the institution’s admission list.

“We also want the public to note that the Board would not abandon its statutory responsibility of ensuring that admission processes are monitored constantly to protect any candidate from being shortchanged.

“To protect the interests of all candidates, the Board assigns a desk officer to each institution to monitor their respective admission transactions and call the attention of management to instances where fairness, equity, and justice are not seen as being upheld.

“The Board has, on many occasions, resolved such instances promptly without the candidates’ knowledge. Sometimes, it is on account of such interventions that some candidates get their admissions late!

“The public and the candidates concerned in this reported issue are assured of the Board’s just intervention in the matter, as their right to admission, if qualified, would not be denied.

“Consequently, all those who uploaded at the right time on CAPS and ranked appropriately would be considered by the university, as stated by relevant advisories.

“We call on candidates, especially high-scoring ones, who are not offered admission and strongly feel they merit such, to take advantage of the Board’s complaints platform and raise requisite tickets as their complaints would be looked into expeditiously and resolved.

“If their application is deemed unsuccessful, they would be provided with sufficient reason(s), if any, why they were not considered for admission. And where they had been unjustly denied their due rights, provided they had met all ranking requirements, the board would ensure that they obtained redress.

“The Board will continue to protect the interests of candidates, irrespective of who they are. This is a task that is amply facilitated by CAPS, a platform established to automate the admission process, eliminate human interference, and engender transparency by allowing all stakeholders to view their transactions and track such operations to rectify abnormalities, if any,” the statement added. (Nigerian Tribune)

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