Group Faults JAMB over Email Registration for Minors 

Emma Okonji

The ongoing registration exercise for entrance examination into tertiary institutions for the 2017/2018 academic year, being organised by the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB), which mandates candidates to register with their personal email addresses, has been criticised.

The immediate past president of Information Technology Systems and Security Professionals (ITSSP), Mr. Rogba Adeoye who criticised the order given by JAMB, mandating students to open personal email addresses as part of the criteria for registration, said such orders negate the online protection of the students who are regarded as minors.

According to him, most of the students that register for JAMB were below 18 years of age and needed some forms of online protection since they are minors.

“Since JAMB registration is done online for the purpose of efficiency, it will be out of place to make it compulsory for candidates who are minors to open personal email addresses and be exposed to the dangers of the Internet without proof of protection from JAMB,” Adeoye said.

He therefore called on Registrar of JAMB to reverse the order of compulsory personal email address, and revert to the initial rules, where the email addresses of parents and guardians were allowed for JAMB registration.

He insisted that that the idea of candidates’ email addresses will lead to child abuse since they are minors and needed protection when online. It is on record that JAMB admits 16 years of age and even less, into tertiary institutions, who are not yet adult, so why should the same JAMB made it compulsory for the same candidate who is below 18 years to get personal email address, knowing fully well they are minors that needed online protection, Adeoye quarried JAMB. He said candidates below 18 years should be allowed to use their parents or guardian email addresses to enable the parents monitor what their children and wards who are minors, do online.

He however commended the recent cancellation of Mock JAMB examination by JAMB, since majority of the interested candidates were yet to register, owing to challenges resulting from slow registration exercise, occasioned by low bandwidth in most registration centres.

While commending JAMB for introducing mock examination, Adeoye said it would help the candidates to familiarise themselves with the Computer-Based Test (CBT) introduced by JAMB, but said JAMB should be able to register all interested candidates before conducting the mock exam, to enable all candidates to participate and get the experience, before the actual JAMB examination.

Adeoye blamed the registration challenges currently being faced by JAMB candidates on limited broadband, which he said had compelled most centres to get limited bandwidth fir registration because of the high cost of bandwidth in the country. JAMB should not be blamed for the slow registration of candidates, instead the network operators should be blamed, since there are not enough broadband for the release of sufficient bandwidth for registration and for other online activities, Adepye said, adding that the situation had forced JAMB to close down some registration centres in the past, that could not provide enough bandwidth for JAMB registration exercise.