By Abimbola Ogunnaike
Romanus Ejikeme, father of embattled Anambra student, Mmesoma Ejikeme, who recently confessed to the forgery of the result of her 2023 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination has pleaded with the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and Nigerians at large to forgive his daughter, saying his daughter didn’t confess her “crime” to him on time.
Speaking in an interview with the Nigeria Television Authority, Ejikeme said, “My daughter didn’t open up to me on time. When I realised the mistake she did, I blamed her a lot but I’m still apologising to JAMB and Nigerians to pardon her.”
Recall that JAMB had Sunday, 2 July, 2023 accused Mmesoma of manually inflating her 2023 UTME result from 249 to 362. The embattled student had gone ahead to obtain a scholarship from Innoson, a scholarship which has now been withdrawn by the company.
Despite multiple facts presented by the Board, Mmesoma insisted her result was not forged and noted that she printed her result from the website of JAMB.
Following her insistence, the Board slammed a three-year ban on her with the House of Representatives calling for a stay of action.
The controversy led the Anambra State Government to institute a panel of enquiry to investigate the matter.
This followed the correspondence to the government from Ejikeme saying she scored the highest in the UTME exams, demanding recognition and rewards from the state government.
Subsequent enquiry by the government at JAMB indicated that the result presented by Ejikeme was forged which prompted the government to institute the panel of enquiry.
The panel submitted its report on Saturday, 8 July, 2023, confirming that indeed Ejikeme forged her result.
