Owoeye Daniella Jesudunsin, a 16-year-old candidate from Ekiti State, scored 372 out of 400 to emerge as the highest-scoring candidate in Nigeria’s 2026 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination.
However, Owoeye sat the examination in Ogun State, not Ekiti. That distinction raises an important question about what the annual list of UTME top scorers really tells us about the geography of educational success in Nigeria.
A review of the highest-scoring candidates between 2020 and 2026 shows that some states of origin have appeared more often than others.
But the figures must be handled carefully. They show where candidates come from, not necessarily where they attended school, received coaching or prepared for the examination.
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Anambra State has produced the highest-scoring candidate three times during the seven UTME cycles from 2020 to 2026.
Maduafokwa Egoagwuagwu Agnes, an Anambra indigene, led the 2020 examination with 365 marks. Umeh Kamsiyochukwu Nkechinyere, also from Anambra, recorded the highest score of 360 in 2023.
In 2025, Okeke Chinedu Christian, another candidate from Anambra, scored 375. His result is the highest recorded among the national leaders during the period under review.
Ekiti State follows with two appearances.
Adebayo Eyimofe Oluwatofunmi, an Ekiti indigene, topped the 2022 examination with 362 marks. Owoeye returned Ekiti to the top in 2026 with her score of 372.
Lagos State produced the leading candidate in 2021 when Monwuba Chibuzo Chibuikem scored 358. Reports from JAMB’s policy meeting identified him as a Lagos candidate who also sat the examination in the state.
The 2024 examination produced a three-way tie. Olowu Joseph Oluwasijibomi of Ondo State, Alayande David of Oyo State and Orukpe Joel Ehijele of Edo State each scored 367 marks.
When the three candidates tied in 2024 are counted separately, the seven examination cycles produced nine top-scorer appearances.
South-West states account for five of those appearances: Ekiti twice, and Lagos, Ondo and Oyo once each. Anambra accounts for three, while Edo accounts for one.
Still, the small number of candidates involved is not enough to conclude that one region has a generally stronger education system than another.
A candidate’s state of origin is only one part of the picture.
Owoeye is from Ekiti but sat the 2026 examination in Ogun. Agnes Maduafokwa, the 2020 leader from Anambra, attended Louisville Girls High School in Ijebu-Itele, Ogun State. Umeh, the 2023 top scorer from Anambra, was also a student at Deeper Life High School in Mowe, Ogun State.
These examples suggest that an accurate map of UTME success would need more than candidates’ states of origin.
It would also need to examine where they live, where they attended school, where they received additional lessons and where they sat the examination.
Without that information, it would be misleading to credit a candidate’s performance entirely to the education system of his or her home state.
Many recent top scorers applied for competitive science-related courses, including Medicine, Engineering and Computer Science.
This does not mean science candidates are automatically more likely to top the examination. It simply shows that science-based courses feature regularly among the choices made by recent high performers.
Every UTME candidate takes four subjects. Use of English is compulsory, while the other three subjects depend on the candidate’s proposed course of study.