The House of Representatives Committee on Job Racketeering and the Joint Admissions and Matriculations Board (JAMB) yesterday sharply disagreed on the lopsided employment of 300 staff by the agency.
While the committee insisted that the employment which took place between 2015 and 2023 was against federal character principle, JAMB maintained it followed the principle and it was done out of exigency.
At its resumed hearing, the panel decried lack of adherence to extant regulation 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 chairman of the ad-hoc committee Hon Yussuf Gagdi while grilling the JAMB Registrar, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede said the agency has shortchanged many Nigerians 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 members of the panel stated that JAMB has so far relied on waivers for recruitment of staff against the provisions of the law on non-engagement of more than 100 staff annually.
Gadgi stressed that recruiting about 300 staff through waiver was against the federal character, saying a waiver is to be granted only if an agency is collapsing.
He said, “What makes you think advertising wouldn’t have been better? You have the capacity to 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 sets of recruitment 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 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 very necessary at that time that we recruited and I assure you that we did not surcharge those who are qualified,” Oloyede said.
