Eight universities may deny 143,000 student placements

Worsening infrastructural challenges, regulatory conflicts between the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board and universities, inadequate teaching aids and the unavailability of adequate manpower, among others, may join forces to deny more than 143,000 applicants placement in eight universities in the ongoing 2017-18 academic session, write Iyabo Lawal and Ujunwa Atueyi for The Guardian Nigeria.

The scenario, which could get worse, is a confirmation of the fears raised recently by the National Universities Commission that an admissions crisis was inevitable in the country.

Executive Secretary of the Commission, Professor Abubakar Rasheed, while appearing before the Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and Tertiary Education Trust Fund on 25 October, said only about 30% of the 1.7 million candidates who wrote the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination in 2017 would be offered admission, even as he pointed out that there was a regulatory conflict between the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board and the universities offering admission to candidates.
Full report on The Guardian Nigeria site