The University of Ilorin has again emerged the nation's most preferred higher institution of learning, having attracted far more admission applicants than any other university in this year's Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME).

This is the third consecutive year that the Better-by-far institution will be attracting the highest number of admission seekers. Statistics obtained from the computer-based test conducted between February 27 and March 3 this year across 540 centres in Nigeria and eight overseas countries showed that Unilorin attracted 103, 238 admission seekers, maintaining the record it had set in the last two years. A total of 1,592,305 million candidates sat for the examination conducted by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board this year.

This revelation was contained in an exploratory report on the 2016/2017 pre-admission exercise by one of the nation's leading newspapers, The Punch, entitled "Imo has highest number of UTME candidates". In its edition of Tuesday, June 14, 2016, the newspaper reported that "UNILORIN, as in the last two years, still occupies the first slot in terms of attracting the highest number of applicants. One hundred and three thousand, two hundred and thirty-eight candidates applied to study in the university this year".

According to the report, the University of Benin, Benin City, with 81,363 applicants came second while Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, with 75,383 candidates, came third. The University of Nigeria, Nsukka, attracted 65,954 candidates to place fourth, while Bayero University, Kano, with 64,220 applicants, and Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, with 61,862 candidates came fifth and sixth respectively.

The University of Lagos (Unilag), with 60,659 candidates, is placed seventh while the nation's premier university, the University of Ibadan (UI), with 59,176 candidates, came eighth. In last year's rankings, 68-year-old UI was placed seventh while UNILAG was fifth. Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, retained the ninth position it occupied in 2015. This year, it attracted 45,924 candidates. The University of Jos, which was not among the top 10 most preferred universities in 2015, improved on its rankings, placing 10th this year with 40,366 candidates. For the private universities, the Covenant University, Ota; Afe Babalola University, Ado-Ekiti; Babcock University, Ilishan-Remo; and Igbinedion University, Okada, Edo State, occupied the first four positions in terms of attracting candidates' interest. They had 2, 586; 1,304, 1,248 and 418 candidates in that order.

Missing on the top 10 private universities among candidates this year, are the Bell University, Ota, owned by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, and the American University of Nigeria, Yola, founded by former Vice-President, Atiku Abubakar. The Madonna University, Okija, Anambra State (370); Bowen University, Iwo (329); Al-Qalam University, Katsina (308) and the Baze University, FCT (277) came fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth in that order.

The Bingham University, Karu, with 247 candidates, and Benson Idahosa University, Benin City, with 204 candidates, occupied the ninth and 10th positions, out of the over 60 private universities in the country. Meanwhile, the report also showed that Imo State indigenes topped the list of applicants that sat for this year's UTME with a total of 104,383candidates (about 6.56 per cent) of the 1,592,305 million candidates that sat for the examination conducted by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board this year. Delta State came second on the table with 78,854 candidates (4.95) in the examination.

The third on the table is Anambra State, which produced 77,694 or 4.88 per cent of the candidates. In the examination, Osun State had 72,752 candidates, placing it in the fourth position. The statistics also revealed that Oyo State, with 72,298 candidates (4.54 per cent), came fifth, while Enugu State placed sixth with 69,381 candidates or 4.36 per cent. In the seventh position is Edo State with 66,107 or 4.15 per cent of the candidates, while Ogun State placed eighth with 62,973 candidates. Akwa Ibom State, which placed ninth, had 62,369 candidates, while Benue State, in the 10th position, led the pack from the 19 states in the North with 60,160 candidates.

Kogi State placed 11th on the rankings with 57,694 candidates, whereas Kwara State, which accommodates the University of Ilorin, had 54,606 candidates, placing 12th among the 36 states of the federation. Still on the rankings, the lowest 10 states in terms of applicants are Niger, Borno, Taraba, Adamawa, Jigawa, Yobe, Sokoto, Kebbi, Zamfara and FCT. While 18,231 Niger State indigenes applied for tertiary education this year, Borno and Taraba states had 15,697 and 15,672 candidates respectively. Adamawa, Jigawa, Yobe and Sokoto had 15, 615, 12,664, 10,045, and 10,006 in that order. FCT had only 4,087 candidates. Meanwhile, of the 1,592,305 million candidates that sat for the examination, only 68,481 candidates applied to study Education.

Social Sciences topped the Faculty table with 362,567 candidates. The breakdown further reveals that whereas 336,694 candidates sought to study Medicine, 95,182 others applied to study Law. Engineering/Technical/Environmental courses with 228,195 candidates attracted a higher number of applicants than Administration and Arts/Humanities, which posted 88,029 candidates. Similarly, 217,150 candidates considered Sciences this year, while only 25,445 of the 1,592,305 million candidates applied to study Agriculture.