FG Officially Set 16 Years As Admission Age

The Minister of Education, Tunji Alausa, has announced that the federal government has officially set the entry admission age into the nation’s tertiary institutions at 16.

Naija News reports that Alausa made this known on Tuesday while declaring open the ongoing Policy Meeting of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) in Abuja.

Alausa declared that the official age of 16 set by the government is not negotiable.

He also warned that any admission conducted outside of the Central Admission Processing System (CAPS) would be illegal, and perpetrators would be prosecuted.

Alausa added that the heads of institutions found to be engaged in admission fraud would face prosecution.

Meanwhile, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has reactivated the admission portal of a Civil Engineering graduate of the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA), Jamiu Basola, months after his academic journey was rocked by claims of a “fake admission.”

Naija News reports that Basola, who graduated in 2024 with a Cumulative Grade Point Average of 4.41, had faced rejection during his final clearance for the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) after JAMB declared that his admission did not originate from its system.

Basola, who said he sat for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) in 2017 and was admitted into FUTA in 2018, recounted how his dream of joining the NYSC hit a brick wall when the university’s Student Affairs Division informed him that his name was not on JAMB’s matriculation list.

His inability to log in to his JAMB portal and print necessary documents triggered a series of appeals, as he wrote to key officials in FUTA, including the registrar, vice-chancellor, and the admissions committee chairperson.

Speaking to journalists via telephone on Monday morning, Basola confirmed that his JAMB portal had been restored and his name had finally appeared on the official matriculation list, a key requirement for NYSC mobilisation.