‘Mystery snake swallowed N36m cash in JAMB office’ – Staff Claims

A fraud scandal rocking the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, led to a mind boggling confession by an official in Makurdi, Benue office of the Board. According to the JAMB official, N36million which was gotten from sale of admission scratch cards in the state was swallowed from the cash vault by a mystery snake that comes in the night.

The sales clerk identified as Philomina Chieshe who couldn’t account for the N36m she made in previous years before the abolition of scratch cards but denied stealing the money during interrogation, further disclosed that the mysterious snake has made away with the N36 million cash a number of times.

On who she suspects, Philomena accused her housemaid of conniving with a JAMB staff, Joan Asen, to “spiritually” steal the money from the vault in the account office. In her confessional statement, Philomena said her claims was backed by Joan Asen and her accomplices confession of stealing the money “spiritually” through a mysterious snake that always sneak into the office to swallow the money from the vault.

"I was one of the four sales clerks attached to JAMB office in Makurdi. My responsibility was to sell scratch cards to candidates and not involved in handling the revenues. It was the responsibility of Joan Asen and my other senior colleagues. I only remit money when am done selling the cards.

“Few months ago, there was issue of fraud in the Makurdi office. Auditors were sent from Abuja to carefully flip the record books of the office, to perhaps, ascertain the current state of affairs.

“The state Coordinator, Obilo, was not around when the audit team came. But in the course of the audit, N36 million was discovered to have been missing from the account. An investigation was launched. In the course of the investigation, it was discovered that Joan Asen, who is account staff and a lady outside JAMB have connived to steal the money.

“It was a mystery to me too. I have been saving the money in the bank, but I found it difficult to account for it. So I started saving it in a vault in the office. But each time I open the vault, I will find nothing. I became worried and surprised how the millions of Naira could be disappearing from the vault. I began to interrogate everybody in the house and office, and no one could agree on what might have happened to the money. I continued to press until my housemaid confessed. She said that the money disappeared “spiritually”. She said that a “mysterious snake” sneaked into the house and swallowed the money in the vault” Philomena said.