Charles Dickens’ novel A Tale of Two Cities presents two cities, Paris and London, with contrasting fortunes for French physician Alexander Manette. In the novel, Paris is a city where he serves 18 years in prison and in London, he enjoys freedom, living with his daughter Lucie, whom he had never met. Thus, Paris symbolizes confinement and estrangement while London signifies emancipation and self-discovery. A juxtaposition of the two cities with their dissimilar experiences for Manette inevitably locates their affliction and importance in equal measure. It underscores the wisdom in the old saying, ‘to understand a phenomenon better, first understand its opposite.’
That is why William Blake’s poem The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, where he declares – without contraries there is no progress – will always remain timeless. It then inevitably follows that we must agree with Hegel’s dialectics, where opposites contain each other in themselves, the thesis and antithesis which must produce the synthesis. But Achebe’s submission that “when one thing stands, another thing stands behind it” must be understood in the context of dualities and not necessarily as opposites. Well, enough of the literary-philosophical musings, but surely, anyone committed to dissecting issues in Nigeria must be ready to operate in the arena of detailed logic.
The Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), two separate government agencies, are by no means related either by their functions or procedures of establishment. While one is saddled with the responsibility of conducting entrance examinations to all universities in Nigeria, the other has the onerous responsibility of conducting elections into various political positions in the country. However, an unfortunate factor has united the two agencies but with contrasting outcomes which inspired the title of this essay – A tale of two glitches. During the 2023 presidential elections, INEC complained of glitches and associated system malfunctions, citing them as excuses to abandon the electronic transmission of election results from the polling units nationwide. Even though INEC chairman Mr. Mahmud Yakubu had several times promised Nigerians to transmit results electronically, assuring that no glitches would occur, glitches indeed occurred. But INEC went ahead to shamelessly transmit results manually and announced them.
On the other hand, during the 2025 UTME across the country organized by JAMB, many centres suffered glitches which accounted for the poor performance of candidates. JAMB registrar Prof. Ishaq Oloyode apologised to Nigerians and promptly scheduled another examination for the affected candidates. Although many people have called for the sack or resignation of Oloyede, attributing underhanded practices and wilful manipulation of the process to affect South-Eastern candidates, I do not wish to pursue or analyse the incident from such an ethnic, sectional prism. In a country where resignation and the rendering of a public apology are alien cultures, Ishaq Oloyede should be spared of all the criticism because if Mahmud Yakubu had apologized to Nigerians and cancelled the elections due to glitches, perhaps, Nigeria wouldn’t be mired in the current slippery slope of riveting uncertainty. Setting aside all political, ethnic, and sundry biases, let us critically examine the glitches that occurred in the activities of the two government agencies, which are two different tales with opposing aftermaths.
First, Mahmud Yakubu and INEC. Glitches, a technical malfunction of all the devices of operation which hampered the electronic transmission of results immediately after the election, occurred during the 2023 elections. Yakubu’s alternative of manually transmitting the results from all polling booths across the country was a caricature of the entire process. Instead of apologizing like Prof. Ishaq Oloyede and cancelling the election to schedule another one, the INEC chairman, without any iota of shame or modicum of integrity, announced the results while millions of Nigerians were asleep. Since then, the benefiting government, enthroned through a flawed, mangled process, has been fighting for legitimacy, using every avenue to scurry for support.
Second, Prof. Ishaq Oloyede and JAMB. Millions of Nigerians will undoubtedly attribute more credibility to JAMB than INEC given their historical provenance. Many would easily concede that JAMB holds more importance in their lives than INEC because the children of ordinary people would require JAMB exams to gain admission to a university, while Nigerians can easily survive without INEC. Like INEC elections, JAMB exams witnessed glitches but Ishaq Oloyede refused to grandstand and insult Nigerians as Mahmud Yakubu did. Oloyede accepted his mistakes, condemned the glitches and ordered fresh exams for affected candidates. Recall that the education minister, Maruf Alausa, who is surely from the same existential matrix that produced the INEC chairman, immediately justified the mass failure, using the opportunity to eulogize himself for blocking all the cheating holes in the examination chain. If Maruf Alausa were the JAMB registrar, the entire INEC plot would have played out, there would have been no apology.
Like Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, the two scenarios between JAMB and INEC present a remarkable opportunity to examine the emotions conveyed by two different Nigerians as heads of two separate government agencies. While some people have vehemently condemned Prof. Ishaq Oloyede, calling for his sack or resignation, juxtaposing him with Mahmud Yakubu makes him a saint. Nothing is too good or too bad except by comparison. Like Paris in Dickens’ novel, INEC evokes bitter, ugly memories while JAMB, like London, elicits humility, courage and empathy. If Ishaq Oloyede deserves a sack or resignation for admitting his error and making amends, what does Mahmud Yakubu deserve, a firing squad? It is important to create these parallels to appreciate JAMB and Oloyede while designating Mahmud Yakubu to his rightful place in Nigeria’s overcrowded hall of infamy.
Dickens’ two different tales help us to establish the real nature of the two glitches in INEC and JAMB and apportion the desired consequences. Critical scrutiny of each agency reveals its foibles and strengths. Achebe’s notion of duality demonstrates how INEC stood and JAMB stood behind it, revealing the rot and perfidy in the first agency. Therefore, all reasonable, dispassionate minds must quit canvassing for the sack or resignation of Oloyede. But if we insist that Oloyede must be sacked or forced to resign, we must also weigh the tragic gravity of Yakubu’s actions and recommend a more severe punishment for him beyond sack and resignation.
It is difficult to think about INEC without immediately thinking about the Nigerian judiciary. Therefore, instead of Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, we can think of a tale of three cities. Although the Nigerian judiciary did not conduct any process where glitches occurred, they provided the gloss on INEC’s deceitful tale by rubber stamping the manually collated election results. But the judiciary went further. They collected more bribes than any agency of government in 2023 and with a horrific show where they declared a fourth-place person in an election as the winner and governor. The tale of the Nigerian judiciary shall be studied in the annals of Nigerian history with conscious dedication in our search for truth and a redefinition of treachery. After JAMB released the results of the 2025 examinations, many parents and private bodies wanted to take the examination body to court. Oloyede did not allow it. If he had sold honour at the marketplace like Yakubu and allowed the matter to go to court, as a government agency, he would have won convincingly and nothing would have happened. But being aware of the judiciary’s castrated conditions, he wore the coat of honour and refused to indulge the judiciary.
From the analysis above, we learn that when glitches occur, the final result of the ‘glitched’ process must be cancelled and rescheduled. Thus, JAMB has exposed INEC as a dubious, manipulating, and insincere body capable of submerging the entire country under the cesspool of ignominy. Indeed, it appears that Prof. Ishaq Oloyede is aware of Yakubu’s duplicity and decided to toe the path of honour which many Nigerians now repudiate. In conclusion, I would invite Nigerians to pause for a moment and consider what would have happened if Prof. Ishaq Oloyede were the INEC chairman before the 2023 elections. Although one may argue that the stakes are not the same with different circumstances, if Oloyede acted on ideological convictions, no amount of graft or inducement would have swayed him to change the fortunes of millions of Nigerians as INEC chairman. The glitches that occurred in INEC and JAMB have exposed the putrid chambers of the electoral umpire. It is a tale of two glitches but Nigerians should know better.
***Promise Adiele PhD, Mountain Top University, promee01@yahoo.com, X: @drpee4