JAMB under fire over N6.5bn spending on local training, N1.1bn meals, refreshments

The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has disclosed that it spent N1.1 billion on meals and refreshments, as well as N850 million on security, cleaning, and fumigation in 2024.

JAMB Registrar, Prof. Is-haq Oloyede, revealed these figures while defending the agency’s 2025 budget proposal before the National Assembly Joint Committee on Finance.

Oloyede also noted that JAMB remitted N4 billion to the Consolidated Revenue Fund during the year, while receiving a N6 billion grant from the federal government.

The disclosure did not sit well with members of the committee, who questioned why JAMB, which is considered a self-funding agency, continues to receive government funding.

Abiodun Faleke, the Chairman of the House Committee on Finance, raised concerns, asking, “You remitted N4billion and got N6billion from the Federal Government. Why not keep the N4billion and we stop the government from funding JAMB?”

Senator Adams Oshiomhole also criticised the agency’s expenditure, questioning, “You spent N1.1billion on meals and refreshments.

“Are you being freely fed by the government? What this means is that you are spending the money you generate from poor students; many of them orphans.”

Oshiomhole further queried JAMB’s N850million spending on security, cleaning, and fumigation, asking, “What did you fumigate? Is it mosquitoes that took all this money?”

He also condemned the N600million spent on local travel and pressed Oloyede to justify the N6.5billion allocated for local trainings.