Conflicting accounts by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), the Benue State Police Command and Governor Hyacinth Alia have created uncertainty over the id of passengers kidnapped alongside the Makurdi–Otukpo highway on Wednesday, April 15.
Whereas JAMB and the police insist that not one of the victims was candidates for the 2026 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) and the state governor maintains that eight of these rescued had been college students travelling and scheduled to sit down the examination.
In an announcement issued by the police spokesperson, Udeme Edet, on 17 April, the command dismissed experiences that the victims had been UTME candidates as claimed.
“The command additionally needs to make clear misinformation circulating in some information media suggesting that the victims had been a part of a convoy conveying college students to jot down the UTME. The command states that this declare is wrong,” the assertion learn.
It added that the victims weren’t “confirmed to be a part of any organised UTME-bound pupil convoy however passengers in a Markudi-bound bus.”
Equally, JAMB, in a separate assertion signed by its spokesperson, Fabian Benjamin on 18 April, mentioned experiences linking the incident to its examination had been “misguided.”
“Notably, not one of the victims had been UTME candidates. Fairly, they had been people who had travelled to Makurdi to take part within the ongoing police recruitment train and had been returning to Otukpo on the time of the incident,” the board mentioned.
Nonetheless, Governor Alia gave a special account on Sunday after receiving 13 rescued victims on the Authorities Home in Makurdi.
“Among the many victims had been eight college students travelling to sit down for the JAMB examinations,” he mentioned.
He appealed to JAMB to make “particular preparations” for the affected candidates to sit down their examinations.