The Anambra State Government has taken a unique approach in handling the case of 19-year-old Mmesoma Ejikeme, who was found to have forged her Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) result.
According to the state Commissioner for Education, Prof. Ngozi Chuma-Udeh, Mmesoma has been handed over to a psychotherapist for a three-month guidance and counseling program.
Chuma-Udeh said Mmesoma would undergo a therapy class for three months as recommended by the state panel, which probed the UTME forgery case.
Mmesoma, a student of Anglican Girls Secondary School, Nnewi, recently made the headlines after the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board called her out for fraudulently manipulating her UTME score from 249 to 362, thereby falsely parading herself as UTME top scorer for 2023.
Before admitting the forgery, Mmesoma had engaged JAMB in accusation and counter-accusation, with the exam body slamming a three-year ban on her.
On Wednesday, she appeared before a panel of the House of Representatives in Abuja, where she tendered an apology to the exam body and pleaded for leniency.
While briefing journalists on Thursday, the Anambra State Commissioner for Education recalled that a panel set up by the state to investigate the matter recommended that the teenager should be made to undergo a psychological counselling and therapy.
Chuma-Udeh said, “We considered what Mmesoma did as ‘juvenile delinquency’ to which any child could fall victim. So, we are not going to throw the baby away with the bath water. She is now under a psychotherapist counsellor who will take her on therapy for three months after which the state government will appeal to JAMB management on behalf of her to reconsider one or two things.”
The commissioner commended Anambra State Governor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, for approving the psychotherapy class for Mmesoma.