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Reps, JAMB Clash Over 300 Employment Slots

Published

9 months ago

August 15, 2023

Stella Charles Akupue

The House of Representatives Committee on Job Racketeering and the Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board (JAMB) yesterday sharply disagreed on the agency’s lopsided employment of 300 staff.

While the committee insisted that the employment between 2015 and 2023 was against the federal character principle, JAMB maintained it followed the guide and was done out of exigency.

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At its resumed hearing, the panel decried lack of adherence to extant regulations of public service, saying it discovered that JAMB employed the staff without advertising and demanded that the list of all the employees should be immediately submitted.

The ad-hoc committee chairman, Hon Yussuf Gagdi, while grilling the JAMB Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, said the agency has shortchanged many Nigerian citizens according to their employment records.

Gagdi said from the documents available to the panel, the board had been employing without due process of advertisement, shortlisting and interview of job seekers.

The chairman and other panel members stated that JAMB has so far relied on waivers for staff recruitment against the law’s provisions on the non-engagement of more than 100 staff annually.

Gadgi stressed that recruiting about 300 staff through waiver was against the federal character, saying a release should be granted only if an agency collapses.

He said, “What makes you think advertising wouldn’t have been better? You can screen the people that apply to get better hands to do those jobs. I’m asking this because we are most interested in correcting the fraud associated with waivers.”

But, Oloyede, in his response, said the board followed the federal character principles in the job recruitment exercise it conducted from 2015 till date.

He said the board had gotten a waiver from the relevant agencies to employ staff to replace those that had left, disclosing that the board had five recruitment sets in the period under review.

The registrar said JAMB had sought a waiver to recruit over 300 people instead of advertising because of exigencies of duty as about 12-13 centres were coming on board, and there was a need to man them.

“We used the waiver because we believe the exigency of the time and the nature of our work deserves it. If we were to advertise for the three hundred, we wouldn’t be able to meet up with what we needed them for.

“I believe very strongly that it was essential at that time that we recruited, and I assure you that we did not surcharge those who are qualified,” Oloyede said.

He also said the alleged lopsided employment by the examination body was due to the need to fill vacancies in the over 40 offices in different federation states. He added that most staff recruitment was done after consultation with state governors.

However, Gagdi, in his ruling, said the agency must submit the nominal roll of its staff recruited within the period in tabular form state by state.

On the other hand, the committee took more oral testimonies from Babamasi Jalo, Abdulaziz Azara, Musa Ibrahim and two other victims of employment racketeering by the former Federal Character Commission (FCC) Haruna Kolo staff.

Jalo told the panel that Kolo had collected N1.2 million from him for IPPIS capturing and asked him to look for other persons employed in the FCC and the National Institute of Oceanography and Marine Research Lagos for salary payment.

Reps Committee queries JAMB over recruitment of 300 staff – Legal Attorney Blog.

The witness said he made several payments of huge funds into the accused man’s account number running into millions of naira, adding that the suspect told him that he transferred all the money to the commission’s chairperson.

After the testimonies, the committee ruled that Kolo, the Director of IPPIS in the Office of Accountant-General of the Federation and the other accused persons in the scandal must appear unfailingly before it concludes the investigation.

Last week, The ad-hoc committee issued a warrant of arrest on Kolo, a former staff of FCC who allegedly acted as a middleman for selling employment slots at the commission.

While issuing the warrant, the panel chairman, Gagdi, said if Kolo did not show up for the probe, he would be brought in by the security agencies and instructed his current employer, AMCON, to produce the staff for the examination.