UTME Fee May Increase as JAMB Cites Rising Operational Costs

JAMB says it has remitted over N50 billion as operating surplus to the Federal Government in the last 10 years, credits technology-driven reforms for major cost savings, and hints that the UTME registration fee may increase due to rising operational costs.

The Public Communication Adviser of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, Dr Fabian Benjamin, has disclosed that the examination body has remitted over N50bn as operating surplus to the Federal Government in the last 10 years.

Benjamin stated this during a dialogue organised by the Education Writers’ Association of Nigeria via Zoom.

The dialogue, themed “2026 Admission Policy Review and JAMB Scorecard: A Conversation with the Registrar,” examined key issues surrounding admissions and tertiary education in Nigeria and provided an overview of Prof Ishaq Oloyede’s leadership of the board for the past 10 years.

According to Benjamin, the remittances were made in compliance with the law requiring government agencies to remit a percentage of their operating surplus and should not be misconstrued as evidence that JAMB was established to generate revenue.

He said, “There is an impression that JAMB has become a revenue-generating agency. It is not,” he said.

“JAMB is not a revenue-generating agency. But there is a regulation that every agency, whether revenue-generating or not, must remit a certain percentage of its excess surplus. What JAMB is doing is not out of place. It is part of the rule.

“In the last 10 years, I cannot state the exact amount generated, but I can say that over N50bn has been remitted back to the Federal Government as excess surplus.”

Benjamin explained that the board was able to generate savings through technological innovations and cost-cutting measures introduced under the Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede.

Recall that earlier in the year, a director in the office of the JAMB registrar, Muftau Bello, when he presented the board’s 2026 budget proposal before the Senate committee on tertiary institutions and TETFund, projected N23.8bn in internally generated revenue for 2026 and planned to remit N6bn to the Federation Account as operating surplus.

In his overview of Oloyede’s tenure, he recalled that the board, in 2016, replaced the Very Small Aperture Terminal technology previously deployed for examinations with telecommunication-based connectivity using SIM cards.

According to him, the transition reduced the cost of connectivity for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination from about N1.2bn to less than N100m.

“When Prof. Oloyede came in, we were mounting VSAT dishes in all examination centres and paying about N1.2bn for the exercise. He believed technology should enable the board to examine at a far lower cost.

“He invited the service providers to reduce the cost, but they declined. The board then adopted the use of telecom providers and SIM cards, which we still use today, bringing the cost down to less than N100m,” he said.

Benjamin noted that despite initial setbacks, including technical hitches during the maiden mock examination in 2017, the reforms had transformed the board’s operations and strengthened the integrity of its examinations.

He added that innovations such as the introduction of mock examinations, computer-based testing and biometric verification had significantly reduced impersonation and other forms of examination malpractice.

The spokesman, however, hinted that the current Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination registration fee of N3,500 may not be sustainable given prevailing economic realities.

He recalled that the fee was reduced from N5,000 to N3,500 in 2018 following operational savings but said rising costs could necessitate a review.

“As I speak with you, there is a debate on whether that is still practicable because of the rising cost of things. I will not be surprised if the fee is likely to go up again,” he said.

Benjamin maintained that JAMB currently charges one of the lowest examination fees globally.

“Our fee is N3,500. No examination body charges anything close to that. We are charging at the barest cost of running the examination,” he said.

He explained that the registration fee was shared with accredited Computer-Based Test centres, most of which are privately owned, adding that many operators had complained that the amount paid to them was no longer sufficient due to rising operational costs.

“Part of the money we collect belongs to the CBT centres because they render services for us. Many of them are already complaining that what we pay is too meagre because diesel and other operational costs have increased,” he said.

Benjamin stressed that any future review of the examination fee would be based on prevailing economic conditions rather than a deliberate attempt to increase revenue.

Oloyede’s tenure ends on July 31, 2026, with Prof Segun Aina to officially resume office on August 1, 2026.