UTME 2019: JAMB’s best candidate who is denied admission into his university of choice, Another university offers him a straight admission

Ekele Franklin, the 15-year-old boy who emerged the overall best candidate in the 2019 Unified Tertiary Matriculations Examination (UTME), is denied admission into his university of choice – University of Lagos – because of age, he could very well walk into another school to start his studies.

A private school, Gregory University, Uturu, in Abia State, has offered the Nigerian teenager a straight admission.

Franklin scored 347 in the UTME.

Ishaq Oloyede, the registrar of the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB), who mentioned Franklin’s score while announcing the release of this year’s UTME results, said the teenager, who is from Imo State, may not be offered admission because of age.

The Chancellor of Gregory University, Gregory Ibe, a professor, has directed the university to offer admission, as well as a scholarship to Mr Franklin, a source close to Mr Ibe told PremiumTimes, Sunday afternoon.

“I have confirmed it from the chancellor, so you can take that to the bank,” said the source who did not want his name mentioned in the story since he is not an official of Gregory University.

Gregory University is also offering admission and scholarship to Emmanuel Chidebube, a 16-year-old boy from Abia, who came second with a score of 346 in the UTME.

“When somebody does something good, the world needs to hear about it,” the source said. “Imagine if these students are rejected by the University of Lagos. Imagine wasting young geniuses like that.”

VAM gathered a reports that the courses the two teenagers want to study at the university are unknown for now.

Gregory University, named after a Catholic Pope, was founded in 2012.

The university, according to information on its website confirmed by VAM News, it has eight colleges, which includes medicine and health sciences, engineering, environmental sciences, agriculture, natural and applied sciences, and a college of social and management sciences, Others are law and humanities.

The university’s chancellor, Mr Ibe, said on the website that the school has modern state-of-the-art studios, well-equipped laboratories, stacked libraries, and uses sophisticated teaching aids and ICT solutions to “empower scholars with the necessary knowledge, skills, and abilities that make them stand out in the global world.