The Federal Government has pegged the minimum admissible age for candidates seeking admission into tertiary institutions in Nigeria at 16 years.
Minister of Education Tunji Alausa announced this on Tuesday during the 2025 Policy Meeting on Admissions, held at the Bola Ahmed Tinubu International Conference Centre in Abuja.
The 16-year age requirement will be enforced through its Central Admissions Processing System (CAPS), with efforts made to accommodate candidates who would turn 16 by 31st August 2025.
However, JAMB expressed concern that some institutions had violated this directive by admitting underage candidates through channels outside CAPS and collecting substantial amounts from them as tuition fees.
“The Board implemented the 16-year admissible age on its CAPS platform and even bent backwards to accommodate candidates who would be 16 as of 31st August 2025.
“However, some institutions admitted candidates who were not up to the admissible age of 16 outside CAPS and even collected huge sums of money from them as tuition fees,” JAMB stated.
The Board noted that all such admissions were illegal and could not be processed through CAPS, adding that some of these cases had led to litigation against the offending institutions.
The 16-year minimum admission age comes after last year’s controversy, when former Education Minister, Prof. Tahir Mamman, faced backlash from stakeholders over his attempt to raise the benchmark to 18, a move many said was criticised.