Date: 2016-10-14

THE Senate Thursday passed into law that which would guarantee the validity of any admission offered by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB to any candidate for a period of three academic years from the date of the conduct of Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).

Also, the Senate finally put to rest the controversy trailing the conduct of the Post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (Post-UTME) by the Universities, thereby declaring it illegal and unconstitutional, just as the upper chambers said that with the decision, the question of who was in charge of admission has been answered.

Deliberating on the report by the Senator Barau Jibrin led Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETFUND, of a Bill for an Act to amend the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, Act and other matters connected thereof, 2016( SB.245), the senators amended subsection (a) of section 5 to read as follows: " 5(b) the Matriculations Examinations conducted by the Board shall be the sole examinations required for admission and entry into all Universities, ' Polytechnics (by whatever name called) and Colleges of Education (by whateVer name called), to the exclusion of any other institution or body."

With the passage of the bill, it would now require the president to assent to the bill where it would then become a law and with the bill coming from the Executive, President Muhammadu Buhari may not delay in the signing of the bill into law.

It would be recalled that on Wednesday 1st June 2016, the Senate of Federal Republic at its sitting read JAMB Amendment bill 2016 (SB.245) the second time and referred same to the Committee on Tertiary Institutions and Tetfund. The purpose of the bill was to amend the JAMB Act to increase validity period of JAMB examination from one academic year to three academic years.

The Committee in considering the Bill, made reference to Votes and Proceedings and Verbatim reports of Wednesday 2nd March 2016, particularly to the contributions of Members regarding the financial hardship experienced yearly by parents/guardians in Sponsoring the candidates for JAMB examination.

On the three year validity of the result, the report said, " Validity of Section 6: ' "6. (i)any examination conducted by the Board pursuant to the powers conferred by this Act shall be valid for a period of three academic years from the date of the examination.