OPINION: Acceptance Fee Should Be Abolished In All Nigerian Tertiary Institutions By Caleb Ijioma

Acceptance fee should be abolished in all Nigerian tertiary institutions

Our dear tertiary institution have over the years found a legal way to extort students who ordinarily find it difficult to pay for their school fees after they’ve been granted admission.

You will agree with me that the number of students granted admission per year is low compared to the number of students who applied. Most times, students go as far as paying a stipulated amount just to secure admission.

According to reports made by Allafrica.com, no fewer than one million students seeking admission through the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, every year have failed to get slots in tertiary institutions in Nigeria as the system cannot admit more than 600,000 in any given year.

In 2013, 1,629,102 registered for UTME, in 2014, it was 1,606753 and 1,000,400 in 2015. For 2016, a total of 1,589,175 registered, just as 1,736,571 and 1,662,762 registered in 2017 and 2018 respectively.

With 158 universities and 115 polytechnics, colleges of education and monotechnics, their carrying capacity is still slightly above 600,000. Meanwhile, an average of 1.6 million UTME candidates register for entrance examination yearly.

After going through the pains of waking up late at night to read, paying much to get tutored, after all this, you’re being admitted and later asked to pay in other to accept the admission giving to you.

I am of the opinion that after a student have secured an admission, which cannot be possible without purchase of the application form, such student shouldn’t be mandated to pay any amount to accept the admission giving to him/her by their school authorities.

Telling me to pay for an acceptance fee means you are telling me to pay to accept my admission giving to me in good fate by the school authorities who found me worthy of such admission.

Acceptance fee in some institutions are outrageous, some students pay N60,000 for acceptance fee, an amount that is more than some tertiary institution school fees.

After paying for JAMB, you go on to pay for the application form, then after you’ve been granted admission, you pay for acceptance fee, then school fees. This is just too much.

Even though education in Nigeria is becoming expensive, some unnecessary fees mandated by school authorities should be abolished; acceptance fee most importantly.

Caleb ijioma is a journalist and a youth advocate. He can best be reached via email at calebijioma@gmail.com