The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board says thousands of graduates who have been unable to join the National Youth Service Corps for years may finally be cleared to serve. The board’s Registrar, Professor Segun Aina, said JAMB was launching a National Identification Number alignment service that would allow candidates to correct their biodata to match their official identity records. He disclosed this in Abuja while receiving a delegation from Veritas University led by its Vice-Chancellor, Rev. Fr. Professor Hyacinth Ichoku.
“I am pleased to announce that today we will be formally launching an NIN alignment service that will allow candidates to change their biodata to match their official identity and that will unlock the possibility of NYSC for thousands of people,” Aina said. According to the registrar, the board had found graduates who completed their studies four or five years ago but could not proceed to national service because their details on JAMB’s records did not match those held by the National Identity Management Commission. He did not give an exact figure but estimated that thousands were affected.
For these graduates, the cost of a mismatched name or date of birth goes far beyond paperwork. NYSC checks prospective corps members against JAMB’s matriculation records, and a mismatch can stop mobilisation outright. Without a discharge or exemption certificate, graduates are generally locked out of government jobs and many private sector openings. Under NYSC rules, graduates above 30 are not mobilised but issued exemption certificates instead, which means time spent waiting can permanently change a graduate’s path.
JAMB has since given more detail on how the window works. The board described it as a reopening of its NIN alignment service and warned that it was a one-time opportunity, adding that submitting an application would not guarantee approval. It told candidates to first correct any errors with NIMC and ensure the changes had reflected on their NIN records before applying. The board did not announce a closing date and urged candidates to avoid third-party agents and use only its official portals.
The problem sits at the meeting point of two national databases that have grown closer in recent years. JAMB tied candidate registration to the NIN, and at the board’s 2025 policy meeting the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, declared that the integration had come to stay. The scale of the system makes small errors costly. JAMB said 2,243,816 candidates registered for the 2026 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, a 10.5 per cent rise on the 2.03 million recorded in 2025, while 1,009,044 of 2,007,312 applicants secured admission last year.
Aina also offered candidates who have lost access to the email addresses or phone numbers used during registration a way back. He said such candidates could now update those details and regularise their records, unlike in the past when the problem could block them from carrying out any transaction with the board. He described his mission at JAMB as building trust and reducing trauma, saying technology would be used to remove avoidable obstacles.
The registrar was less hopeful about another group of stranded graduates. He said the board had yet to find a solution for many candidates admitted outside its Central Admissions Processing System, who may have completed their programmes but are not recognised in its records. “It is not just one person that you tell to go away and come back; it is a life that can be destroyed by the work that you do,” he told the university’s officials.
That problem has a long history. JAMB introduced CAPS in 2017, and in November 2021 the board disclosed that institutions had admitted 706,189 candidates outside the system between 2017 and 2020. JAMB regularised many of those admissions under a waiver granted by the then Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, but has maintained that admissions conducted outside CAPS since 2020 cannot be regularised. In August 2024, it gave institutions one final month to disclose candidates illegally admitted before 2017.
Aina also disclosed that JAMB was considering adding life skills and critical thinking assessments to the UTME. He said a committee had been set up to study how the components could be integrated, giving universities a wider basis for selecting candidates. “We should be able to find institutions that will say our cut-off for this course is 200, but we will take 190 if you score over 80 per cent in the critical-thinking and life-skills component of the examination,” he said.
The proposal remains at the committee stage, and the registrar said it would require collaboration between JAMB and tertiary institutions. He stressed that his administration did not intend to introduce disruptive policy reversals but to improve the implementation of existing policies. Aina, a Professor of Computer Engineering at Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, was appointed by President Bola Tinubu in May to succeed Professor Is-haq Oloyede, whose tenure ended on July 31, 2026, making him the youngest registrar in the board’s history.
Ichoku congratulated Aina on his appointment and pledged Veritas University’s cooperation with the board. He also invited the registrar to the Pan-African University Debating Championship, which the university is hosting with the endorsement of the Federal Ministry of Education.