A lawyer, F.K. Nnadi, has issued pre-action notices to the University of Lagos (UNILAG) and Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife, over alleged irregularities in the conduct and release of their 2025 Post-Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (Post-UTME) results.

The notices, signed by the firm’s principal counsel, Kene Nnadi, accused the two universities of awarding unjustifiably low scores to some candidates while withholding the results of others without explanation, a move the firm warned could jeopardize the admission chances of affected students.

The petitions also extended to the National Universities Commission (NUC) and the House of Representatives Committee on Tertiary Education, urging them to intervene and enforce transparency in the process.

Education technology advocate and CEO of Educare, Alex Onyia, amplified the matter online, raising questions about the credibility of Post-UTME screenings.

The law firm gave OAU three months and UNILAG 30 days to comply with its demands. These included providing access to candidates’ Post-UTME scripts and marking schemes, releasing all withheld results, and allowing students accused of malpractice to defend themselves before any sanctions are imposed.

The notices cautioned that failure to comply would lead to legal action at the Federal High Court to enforce students’ rights, including seeking declaratory reliefs, injunctions, and damages.

UNILAG, however, denied any fault in its Post-UTME exercise. Its spokesperson, Adejoke Alaga-Ibraheem, explained that cases flagged for malpractice were based on “clear breaches of examination guidelines,” which were verified through various monitoring systems, including video surveillance.

Onyia countered that both universities relied on the same Post-UTME software, which allegedly contained a bug that wrongly flagged candidates for malpractice and mismatched scores. He noted that over 752 complaints had been recorded from students and called for an independent audit for any institution willing to submit its processes for review.

The controversy comes amid a difficult year for national examinations in Nigeria. Earlier in May, the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) admitted to a glitch on its UTME platform that disrupted the exams of more than 370,000 candidates, leading to a rescheduled test. Likewise, the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) suspended its online result checker due to technical issues before revising performance figures from 38% to 62%.

In its petitions, F.K. Nnadi & Co. pressed for fairness and accountability, insisting that regulators and lawmakers direct both universities to release the withheld results of students not accused of wrongdoing and to grant access to scripts and marking schemes in the interest of transparency.