• Demand report on paper leak, exam guidelines
From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
The House of Representatives Committee on Basic Examination, yesterday, grilled the West African Examination Council (WAEC) Head of Nigeria Office, Amos Dagnut, over the conduct of the West Africa Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) at night in different parts of the country.
The lawmakers, who were furious that the examination body traumatised the candidates, demanded a report on the alleged leak of the examination that resulted in WAEC conducting the examination in some states late at night and the examination body’s guidelines within 24 hours.
Chairman of the committee, Oboku Oforji, said Nigerians especially parents of the affected candidates deserved an explanation from WAEC.
“This committee wants to know, parents and Nigerians want to know, we owe them a duty of care, and to whom much is given, much is expected; monies were appropriated by Parliament for the conduct of these examinations. We are not trying to kill a fly with a sledge hammer as a committee, but like I said in the last meeting, we need to know the immediate and remote causes of the woeful conduct of the examinations, and in doing this we may forestall a future occurrence.”
The Head of Nigeria Office (HNO), WAEC, Amos Dagnut, blamed the development on logistics, which arose, following leakage of question paper earlier.
Dagnut told lawmakers that though the examination was originally scheduled for 2pm, it eventually started at 7pm in some of the areas affected, noting that teachers, invigilators, supervisors and parents provided lights for the candidates.
The WAEC boss, who explained that the examination body only prints 50 percent of its question papers and outsource the other 50 percent, said it relies on road transport to convey the papers to the various centres.
Dagnut, while responding to the lawmakers concern that examination papers are conveyed by tricycles, noted “regarding the use of Keke, there are other places you don’t have keke, but motor bikes, so it depends on the available means of transport.”
However, the WAEC declined to disclose the sum contract for the outsourcing of the printing of the 50 percent of the examination papers, saying he did not know it offhand. He equally declined to reveal the procedure for dealing with cases of compromise.
Nonetheless, he explained that “we have a well-articulated procedure in dealing with compromise if they arise. If it is the pleasure of the committee, I can discuss that with the chairman, because we don’t want that procedure to go public.”
The member representing Idemili North/ Idemili South Federal Constituency of Anambra State, Uchenna Okonkwo, expressed doubt if the examination body had done any investigation on what happened. “The registrar should have submitted to us a detailed report of what happened per state, given that we are interested to know what happened. That has not been done.
“The registrar mentioned that there is an existing contract, I want to know how long this contract has been. There should be guidelines. What are the guidelines by WAEC? These guidelines should be submitted to this committee. We need to know.
“You have admitted that this issue has not occurred in any other place apart from Nigeria. So, where are the guidelines for such incidents? He is claiming that there are documents. But it showed that he did not do any work to investigate what happened state-by-state.”