Funmi Ogundare
The Nigeria Examinations Committee (NEC) of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has approved appropriate sanctions for all established cases of malpractice, as prescribed by the rules and regulations governing the conduct of its examinations.
The council also approved that the entire results of candidates involved in proven cases, which attract Cancellation of Entire Results (CER), be cancelled, while subject results of those involved in proven cases, which attract Cancellation of Subject Results (CSR), be similarly cancelled.
The Head, Public Affairs, WAEC, Mr. Demianus Ojijeogu in a statement released after its 68th NEC meeting held between November 5 and 7, in Lagos, states that some candidates would also suffer other sanctions such as barring them from sitting for the council’s examinations for a certain number of years, derecognising some schools for a specified number of years, reporting supervisors who were found wanting in the discharge of their examination duties to their employers and blacklisted, while some invigilators would also be reported to the appropriate authorities for disciplinary action.
“The decisions of the committee will be implemented without delay and the affected candidates and schools duly informed by the council. However, the results of candidates who were exonerated by the committee will be released,” he said.
The committee he said, frowned at the high rate of incidence of candidates bringing mobile phones into the examination halls and called on schools, invigilators and supervisors to enforce the rule barring such, and ensure proper supervision during the conduct of WASSCE.
According to the statement, “The committee decried the penchant of ministry of education officials in some states to hijack the process of appointment of supervisors and urged WAEC to liaise with principals of schools and ministry of education officials in those states to ensure that only credible teachers are appointed to supervise the WASSCE.”
It observed that some subjects were going extinct because of the dearth of teachers in those subjects leading to poor performance of candidates and called on governments at various levels to stem the tide.
The committee, Ojijeogu noted, considered special cases such as clemency appeals from the WASSCE for school candidates, 2019 and restitution cases as well as impounded certificates for various years, while emphasising on the statistics of entries and results for the WASSCE for private candidates, 2018-second series and WASSCE for private candidates, 2019-first series.
The statement reads in parts, “In addition, it received and considered the general résumé of the chief examiners’ reports on the WASSCE for private candidates, 2019-first series and the WASSCE for school candidates, 2019. It also received and considered reports on the activities of the Aptitude Tests Department (ATD), for the period March to September, 2019 and on the activities of the research department of the council for the period April to September, 2019.
“With regard to the general résumé of the chief examiners’ reports on the WASSCE for school candidates, 2019, the committee noted the observation by the chief examiners that the standard of the papers compared favourably with those of previous years and that the questions were within the scope of the syllabuses as well as the ability of the candidates. They also reported that the rubrics were clearly stated and the marking schemes were comprehensive. The committee noted the strengths and weaknesses of the candidates as reported by the chief examiners and the suggested remedies for the weaknesses.”
