It was all over the news over the weekend that N36 million was allegedly swallowed by a strange snake at the Benue branch of the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board office. The Economic And Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC also reacted to the news.
A JAMB Staff, Philomina Chieshe, attached to the Makurdi office of the agency, had claimed that a mysterious snake swallowed N36million which was profit made by the agency through sales and kept in a vault.
JAMB Head of Information, Fabian Benjamin in a statement made available to newsmen, revealed that Philomena is going through other disciplinary measures while security agencies were investigating the matter.
“There is nothing new about the development. It is just one of those cases discovered by the new leadership of JAMB under Prof. Is-haq Oloyede. So the revelation is a result of the new regime of transparency and accountability.
She has been suspended and she is going through all other disciplinary procedures while investigation is ongoing on the matter. Her claim was that a snake came into the office and swallowed the N36m proceeds” he said.
The snake confession came after a team of auditors, dispatched to different state offices of JAMB to take inventory of sold and unsold scratch cards and recover the generated money, met the lady who couldn’t account for N36m made in the previous years before the abolition of scratch cards.
Recall that Nigeria’s Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, who noted the disparity in the remittances of agency in the past which necessitated the probe, said JAMB for the first time remitted N5billion to the government’s coffers with a promise to pay the balance of N3bn, compared to maximum N3million remitted yearly in the last 40 years.
