Rivers State Government will henceforth bankroll the form fees for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) of Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board(JAMB) for all Indigenes and non-indigenes in the state.
Nyesom Wike, the State Governor, who stated this during a visit by the Registrar of JAMB at the Government House Port Harcourt on Thursday said that the gesture of the State Government will commence with the 2020 UTME to be conducted by JAMB, adding that government is committed to ensuring that less privileged students are not denied the opportunity to sit for the examination.
According him: “From 2020, UTME forms for Indigenes and non-indigenes will be paid for by the Rivers State Government. It is important for us to ensure that children of the less privileged don’t bear this burden.
“This offer is to ensure that no qualified candidate is denied the opportunity to write the UTME. For some parents, the fee is nothing, but there are families that cannot afford the fees”.
The Governor also announced the allocation of land at the Greater Port Harcourt City to JAMB for the construction of their Zonal Office.
This was following the Registrar of JAMB, Professor Ishaq Oloyede’s request for the state government to intervene in the infrastructural decay that has hampered the board’s efficiency in the state.
He said: “There are only 12 Computer Based Test centres in Rivers State. This number is grossly inadequate. We urge Your Excellency to allocate land for JAMB to construct a mega computer based test Centre for at least 500 Candidates.
“You are the closest governor to JAMB. Rise and help us. Funding is no longer our problem. We retain N2billion annually from our Internally generated revenue “.
