The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) says that it withheld the results of 262,803 candidates who wrote the 2023 school candidate West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) due to reported cases of examination malpractice.
This was made known by the Head of National Office (HNO) of WAEC, Mr. Patrick Areghan, at a news conference to announce the release of the results.
Areghan at the news conference said that the figure represents 16.29% of the total number of candidates that sat for the examination, adding that this was 6.54% lower than the 22.83% recorded in the same diet for School Candidates in 2022.
Candidates now rely on expo
- He said, “The reasons for this are not far-fetched. Candidates are no longer ready to study, they lack self-confidence and preparations for examinations are poor. There is over-reliance on the so-called ‘Expo’, which is non-existent.
- “Candidates got frustrated when they got to the examination hall and discovered that all they had celebrated was fake. This has pitiably led to some of them failing the examination.’’
He pointed out that all reported cases were being investigated and reports of the investigations would be presented to the appropriate committee of the council for consideration and final decisions.
According to him, the committee’s decisions will be communicated to the affected candidates through their various schools in due course.
- He said, “Candidates affected by these decisions can now call for redress if they so wish. This is our humble way of giving the candidates a fair hearing and thus, maintaining their fundamental human right.’’
Breakdown of results
Giving a further breakdown of the results, Areghan noted that a total of 1,621,884 candidates registered for the examination, from 20,867 recognised secondary schools in the country.
He said that out of 1,613,733 registered candidates that sat for the examination, a total of 1,476,565, representing 91.5% had their results fully processed and released.
Areghan noted that 137,168 others, representing 8.5%, had a few of their subjects still being processed, due to some shortcomings, ranging from nonchallance, lethargy, incomplete CASS upload, disobedience of rubrics, and others associated with the schools and candidates concerned.
He explained that efforts were being made to complete the resolution process, to enable all the affected candidates to speedily get their results fully processed and released within the next couple of days.
The WAEC boss spoke on the analysis of the statistics of the performance of candidates in the examination.
He said it showed that out of the 1,613,733 candidates that sat the examination, a total of 1,361,608 representing 84.38%, obtained credit and above in a minimum of any 5 subjects, that is, with or without English Language and/ or Mathematics.
- Areghan said, “A total of 1,287,920 candidates, representing 79.81 percent, obtained credits and above in a minimum of five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics.
- “Of this number, 616,914, that is 47.9 percent, were male candidates, while 671,006, that is 52.1 percent, were female candidates.
- “The percentage of candidates in this category in the WASSCE for School Candidates in 2022, that is, those who obtained credit and above in five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics, was 76.36 percent, thus, there is a 3.45 percent decrease in performance in this regard.’’
Speaking further, he stressed that the council would continue to sanction all cases of examination malpractice, noting that all supervisors, teachers and candidates perpetrating this evil were not helping the education system.
He warned that state governments yet to pay council registration fees for their candidates would not be able to access the results of such candidates until they pay up.
