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By Gabriel Dike
The May/June 2024 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) will begin today in 22,229 secondary schools nationwide.
No fewer than 1.8 million secondary school students would sit for the examination.
Head of National Office (HNO) of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), Amos Dangut, disclosed this at a briefing in Lagos to announce the start of the school examination today.
Dangut said the examination would run till June 24, spanning seven weeks and six days, adding, “the examination will be conducted in four WAEC member countries, namely: Nigeria, Gambia, Sierra-Leone and Liberia.
“A total of 1,814,344 candidates from 22,229 schools have registered for the examination. Out of this number, 902,328 are males, amounting to 49.73 per cent, while 912,016 are females, which is 50.27 per cent of the total candidature.
He said the statistics showed a further increase in the number of females and males respectively, compared to last year, which is an increase by 192,948.
Dangut said candidates would be examined in 76 subjects, made up of 197 papers. He further stated that about 30,000 secondary school teachers, nominated by various ministries of education, would supervise the examination.
The HNO assured Nigerians that the council has made adequate security arrangements to ensure a smooth conduct of the examination.
“We cannot feign ignorance of the level of insecurity in the country. Conducting examinations has been challenging. Instances of insecurity exist in many places across the country, and conducting examinations in insecurity-prone areas would require extra security arrangements. “Consequently, we are liaising with the inspector general of police and state governments to provide adequate security to ensure the examination is conducted nationally in a safe and secure environment,” he said.
He warned that the council would decisively deal with candidates and examination functionaries who engage in acts of malpractice of any kind during the examination.
He reiterated that the penalties for involvement in examination malpractice would be meted out to erring candidates, supervisors and schools upon establishment of culpability by the Nigeria Examinations Committee (NEC), which is the highest decision-making organ of the council that sits on examination matters in Nigeria.
Dangut said the council, on its part, has rolled out several awareness campaigns nationwide, and organised seminars for school proprietors, principals, students and other key stakeholders, to sensitise them on the immediate and long-drawn effects of examination malpractice.
The HNO said in line with the council’s tradition, the May/June 2024 results would be released 45 days after the conduct of the last paper, while the certificates would be printed and issued to schools in less than 90 days after the release of results.
