A Nigerian cleric has called on the Federal Government to abolish the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, warning that the current admission system is discouraging prospective university students and fuelling a rise in out of school youths across the country.

Apostle Chibuzor Gift Chinyere, Founder and General Overseer of Omega Power Ministries, made the demand during a Sunday sermon at the church's international headquarters in Port Harcourt, citing security risks, financial burdens, and the duplication of examination processes as grounds for scrapping the board.

Central to his argument was the multiplication of examination layers facing Nigerian students before gaining admission into tertiary institutions.

"In Nigeria, you will write WAEC; after WAEC, you will write JAMB; after JAMB, you will write post UTME; then you wait for the school cut off mark and departmental cut off mark. If you don't meet it, you wait another year, register for JAMB again, and start afresh. It is very frustrating," Chinyere stated.

The cleric also aimed the board's 6:30 a.m. examination schedule, disclosing that his organisation bears additional hotel costs for scholarship candidates unable to travel safely at that hour.

"Sometimes I wonder why JAMB fixes exams for 6:30 a.m. Do you know that for all my adopted children under OPM scholarships going for JAMB, I have to give them extra money to pay for hotels?" he queried.

Chinyere further raised alarms over the posting of candidates to centres far from their residences, linking the practice to security vulnerabilities. He referenced reports of abductions involving UTME candidates in Benue State as evidence of the dangers candidates face.

"I saw something on social media that 12 people who went to write JAMB in Benue State were kidnapped. It is really very unfortunate," he revealed.

The OPM founder argued that universities abroad operate without such centralised examinations, relying instead on direct applications and institutional assessments. He maintained that JAMB had lost its relevance, given that tertiary institutions still conduct their own post UTME screening exercises independently.