Candidates for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) entrance examinations recorded an unprecedented increase from 7,547 in 2024 to 30,000 in 2025.

Mohammed Mohammed, the registrar and chief executive officer of the National Business and Technical Examinations Board (NABTEB), disclosed this while monitoring the examination at Federal Science and Technical College (FSTC), Uromi, in Edo.

The examination, supervised by NABTEB, was held at designated centres nationwide, including the FSTC, Uromi.

Mr Mohammed, represented by NABTEB director of research and quality assurance, Pius Osaigbovo, attributed the 300 per cent surge in the examination enrolment to the incentives recently introduced to the TVET by the federal government.

The federal government is offering several incentives to boost TVET, including a monthly stipend of N30,000 for technical college students, as well as free tuition, accommodation, and feeding in some cases.

The government is also providing startup grants and access to business loans to encourage entrepreneurship among TVET graduates.

“Federal government wants to give individuals a survival skill, a skill that is relevant, a skill that makes them employers of labour and be useful to themselves and society.

“At the end of the training, the candidates would be given dual certificates by NABTEB: the usual National Technical or Business Certificate (NTC/NBC) and the National Skills Qualification (NSQ), which is competency-based.

“The drive of the federal government is that of a skill-based education.

“In the TVET, we are going to have a three-year programme, and it is going to be 80 per cent technical and 20 per cent theory,” Mr Mohammed said.

He expressed satisfaction that Nigerians were beginning to embrace technical and vocational education due to the massive enrollment by students seeking placements nationwide.

Mr Mohammed said the examination was seamless and hitch-free, adding that only candidates who completed their registration online before the portal closed on June 12 were allowed to sit for the examinations.

(NAN)