Following the recent shocking news of missing funds at the Joint Admissions and Registration Board (JAMB) Ishaq Oloyede, Registrar of the Board has set up an anti-corruption unit within the examination body.
Oloyede, said the newly-formed unit called the Anti-Corruption and Transparency Unit (ACTU), is a product of his anti-corruption reforms aimed at accountability and transparency in the management of government finances.
He revealed this during the induction of members of the anti-Corruption unit (ACTU) which was conducted by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).
According to a statement by the ICPC, Oloyede said the unit was established based on the numerous corruption matters been handled, a situation he said was beginning to have adverse effect on his other responsibilities.
He also assured the ACTU members of unfettered support promising that he would not hesitate to spend his personal money to facilitate their work if the need arises.
The statement which was signed by Rasheedat Okoduwa,Spokesperson for ICPC, stated further that Oloyede explained the processes that led to returning of N7.8 billion to government coffers as revenue in 2017 by the examination body saying that government never expected such huge amount from the agency.
“A top government officer threatened JAMB to return nothing less than N500 million to the government. Even the officer that was with me in that meeting advised that I should say the agency will be able to return about N600 million. But at the end of the day, we returned N7.8 billion,” he said.
Abdullahi Bako, acting Chairman of ICPC, at the induction lauded the on-going anti-corruption reforms in JAMB.
Bako who was represented by Justin Kuatsea of the Corruption Monitoring and Evaluation Department (CMED) noted that the achievements of JAMB in the anti-corruption fight was worthy of emulation by other government agencies.
The Chairman of ACTU in JAMB, Munirat Lawal in her response said the unit would deliver on its mandate by helping to reduce the incidence of corruption in the agency.
She added that the unit had already begun work by sensitizing staff against corruption and helping to close down some illegal centers for conduct of the Computer Based Test (CBT).
