By Samuel Edu
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The Federal Government has blamed some state governments for the low enrollment in the ongoing National Business and Technical Examination Board (NABTEB) certificate examination.
A total of 54,000 candidates are sitting for the 2023 NABTEB examination nationwide, a sharp decline in enrollment from 88,000 candidates registered for the examination in 2022.
The Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Education, Andrew David Adejo, who monitored the conduct of the examination at the Government Science Technical College, Garki, in Abuja on Tuesday, lamented that some state governments were not doing much to encourage their children to enrol for the examination.
He noted that some states of the Federation were not participating in the exercise because their governors refused to honour their obligations by paying their indebtedness to the Board, noting that after agreeing to register their candidates they would renege on the payment agreement.
Adejo said this time around NABTEB refused to allow such states to register their indigenes for the examination without payment.
He said: “I want to plead with the state governments because some of them have disadvantaged their citizens from this opportunity.
“They agreed to register students for the exams and they do not pay the fees, so a number of states are not allowed to write the exams this year.
“NABTEB has to take that decision because previously, they have been allowing students to take the exams but because the debt is growing, so they have to withdraw the students from taking the exams,” he said.
Adejo urged the state governors to be committed to paying for registered students while expressing hope that with the new sets of governors, there would be a remarkable change in payment for the examinations.
Speaking on improvement in technical education, he said that the country must continue to embrace technical education as a means to guarantee the future of the youths.
He said that the ministry had done a lot in ensuring that at the tertiary education level, opportunities had been provided for technologically focused innovation and entrepreneurship.
Also Speaking, the Chief Executive Officer of NABTEB, Professor Ifeoma Abanihe, said that enrollment for the 2023 examinations came low to 54,000 as against 88,000 in 2022.
Abanihe said this low enrollment was due to the inability of some state governors to pay for the examination of their students and was faced with the option of removing them from the 2023 examinations.
She commended the present administration for introducing student loans while also clamouring for scholarships for technical education students, saying this would encourage more students to go into technical education.
