The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board has released additional 531 results of the recently conducted Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examinations taking the total number of results released to 1,842,897.

This is contained in a statement by the Public Communication Advisor of the Board, Fabian Benjamin, on Tuesday in Abuja.

Mr Benjamin said the board proceeded with the screening of over 64,000 withheld results due to cases of examination misconduct.

He added that the board was examining cases of unverified candidates and would soon come up with a position.

He added that the attention of the board was drawn to some fallacious publications purporting that an unknown candidate, who did not sit for the board’s 2024 UTME obtained scores.

Mr Benjamin described the report as fake, malicious and a calculated attempt to undermine the integrity of the board, urging the public to disregard such publications.

He said that the publication which levelled such a grievous allegation had no details of the candidate for proper verification.

He said, “The board is not surprised as this is the season of mischief-makers, who would want to deceive gullible candidates. The examination template of the board is designed with the highest sense of responsibility and is not an allocation platform where scores are doled out to candidates.

“It is most unfortunate that anybody could even believe such narration or that the story could even gain traction given the board’s integrity. This again has gone to further vindicate the board’s stance that candidates should desist from disclosing their classified details to third parties.’’

He said that in investigating some of the allegations, the board discovered that some of the mischief-makers copied results sent to other candidates.

He stated, “They then edit the details sent to them and then parade this as emanating from the board. The board challenges any candidate, parent or anybody with such a claim to prove it wrong by coming forward with the details of such claims, and the phone number with which such results were conveyed.’’

He said that this development would only propel the board to further tighten the process of checking its results to make it more personalised.

Mr Benjamin said it would be stringent when it should actually be a simple and straightforward exercise.

“The board reiterated that neither its results nor any of its processes have been compromised. Hence, it will continue to protect the integrity of its systems against such malicious actors, who are hell-bent on creating confusion where none existed,” he said.

Mr Benjamin said that the board would add more features such as registration number to the existing UTME result checking process going forward, to make it extra difficult for anybody to edit.

He urged candidates to keep their details secure, noting that for if they were found associating with any of the mischievous elements, they would be treated as collaborators.

The spokesman said that the method of checking the 2024 UTME remained sending UTMERESULT to 55019 or 66019 and not through any other process.

He, therefore, said the result at the moment was not on the board’s website.

(NAN)