As part of its efforts to eradicate examination malpractice and checkmate the activities of ‘’Miracle exam centers', the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, has directed the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) to derecognize for many years any school and Computer Based Test Centres found guilty of aiding and abetting examination malpractice.

The Minister gave the directive in a memo tagged JAMB/R/264A/VOL.4/1 and issued on Tuesday, May 27. According to the ministerial directive regarding the menace of ‘miracle centres’ in the education sector at the secondary school level, any student found culpable in examination malpractice risks a three-year ban from writing examinations conducted by WAEC, NECO, and NABTEB.

“Any school/CBT centre involved in examination malpractice and/or acting as a miracle centre should be derecognised for several years. The duration will be determined by the examination body.'' the Minister said

According to Fabian Benjamin, JAMB’s Public Communications Advisor, the new directive further warned

“If any school/CBT centre is derecognised by any examination body, other sister examination bodies should follow suit and derecognise the same school/CBT centre for the same number of years to run concurrently. This will send a very strong signal to operators of these miracle centres.

Student(s) involved in examination malpractice should be barred from sitting for any external examinations in Nigeria such as those conducted by WAEC, NECO, NABTEB, etc, for three years using the instrumentality of NIN.

This directive is also in accordance with Section 16(2) of the Examination Malpractices Act, which states: “An examination body may, in the exercise of its powers under this section, circulate the name of an offending candidate, supervisor, invigilator, official, school, or examination centre to other examination bodies, which may impose similar punishment.”

The directive stated that the new stringent measure would serve as a deterrent to other students and parents.