According to the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) on Sunday 8, September 2019 released the admission statistics of Nigerian tertiary institutions for the 2018 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), indicating that 443,624 candidates out of a total 1,662,762 candidates got admission into various Nigerian universities.
JAMB gave the breakdown showing that 81,791 candidates secured admission into Polytechnics; 59,498 got admission into Colleges of Education while 585 opted for Innovation Enterprise Institutions.
Accordingly, the Board, which has now closed admission for 2018 academic session, disclosed that the 443,624 candidates were the available spaces filled by students in various disciplines across the Nigerian universities.
Additionally, JAMB disclosed that Nigerian universities have a total admission capacity of 586,962 but admitted 443,624, which means that the universities still have a window of 143,338 spaces to be occupied.
Polytechnics in the country had a total quota of 134,526 admission vacancies but could only fill 81,791 leaving a vacant space of 52,735 students, while the Colleges of Education had 391,615 spaces but admitted only 59,498 candidates with a whopping vacancy for 332,117 students.
Relatedly, the National Universities Commission (NUC), informed that Nigeria has a total of 174 Universities of which 43 are Federal, 52 States and 79 privately owned universities.
When enquired on the vacant admissions across the Nigerian tertiary institutions, the JAMB Head of Information, Dr Fabian Benjamin disclosed that the spaces were not filled because the candidates failed to meet up with the admission requirements.