…principals, teachers, invigilators found wanting too
…experts suggest way forward
The web portal of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) is buzzing feverishly and heating up.
This follows a frenzy of visitations to the portal after Dr. Amos Dangut, head of the WAEC Nigeria Office, said in an address on Monday that 215,627 or 11.92 per cent of the 1,805,216 candidates who sat for the 2024 West African Senior School Certificate Examinations (WASSCE) had had their results withheld on account of exam malpractices.
Many of the purported errant candidates, their parents, guardians, acquaintances are believed to be responsible for the frenzied visitations to the WAEC portal.
To make matters worse, WAEC stated that persons assigned to roles of supervision and authority and in whom much confidence was reposed were caught in the web of the malpractices. These were said to include school principals, teachers, exam invigilators, supervisors, and examiners.
Dangut stressed that the Council would continue to sanction all cases of examination malpractice, noting that schools, supervisors, teachers, and candidates involved in such practices were undermining the educational system.
“The increasing use of mobile phones in the examination hall, despite the existing ban, and organised cheating in some schools, are other nagging issues. All the cases are being investigated, and reports of the investigations will be presented to the appropriate committee of the Council for consideration and final decisions,” Dangut said.
“The committee’s decisions will be communicated to the affected candidates through their various schools in due course. Candidates affected by these decisions can now seek redress for their malpractice cases via our website if they so wish. All hands must, therefore, be on deck to sanitise the system,” he said.
Examination malpractices are listed as including leakages, in which case the content of an examination or part of it is disclosed prior to the exam. The malpractices also include collusion, which is the unauthorised passing of information between candidates usually by exchanging notes or scripts.
Others include impersonation, in which case an individual who is not registered as a candidate for a particular examination takes the place of one that is registered.
There is also the introduction of unauthorised materials such as books, microchips and answers into the examination hall. Also included is the deliberate alteration of marks, designed to inflate or deflate a candidate’s scores.
Stakeholders say these unwholesome practices are rampant in many spheres of life in Nigeria, undermine integrity, competence, quality of life and the economy and need to be addressed.
The Examination Malpractice Act (1999) lists sanctions for related offences thus: “In the case of a person under the age of eighteen years, to a fine of Nl00,000 or imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years or to both such fine and imprisonment”, and “in the case of a principal, teacher, an invigilator, a supervisor, an examiner, or an agent or employee of the examination body concerned with the conduct of an examination, to imprisonment for a term of four years without the option of a fine.”
Sylvanus Ushie Oko of the Department of Accountancy, Cross River University of Technology, and Roseline Ishanga Adie of the Faculty of Law, University of Jos, in a research titled “Examination Malpractice: Causes, Effects and Possible Ways of Curbing the Menace”, attribute examination malpractices in Nigeria to factors including “what most respondents called wrong value system which leads to serious quest for certification instead of knowledge and skills”.
The research says other causes include laziness, lack of preparation or inadequate preparation for examination, lack of self-confidence, poor school facilities (lack of or inadequate examination hall), poor sitting arrangement, socio-economic factors, political undertone, privatisation and commercialisation of education, poor invigilation, weak parental function etc.
“Considering the magnitude and the continuous occurrence of examination malpractice in the Nigerian educational system including the ivory tower, it is no doubt necessary to research into this area before the Nigerian certificates become worthless pieces of paper. The educational system needs to join the anti-corruption crusade to rid the system of this plague,” the research authors said.
“Factors identified as reasons why examination malpractices have not been eliminated or reduced are among others, the fact that, the penalties as stipulated in Act 33 of 1999 constitution have not been fully applied.
“Some respondents however felt strongly that, just as jail term or public execution has not been able to deter armed robbers in Nigeria, a jail term as stipulated in the Act may not stop examination malpractice, hence they advocated for the cut off of the link that exists among the perpetrators of examination malpractice.
“Act 33 of 1999 Constitution stipulates cancellation of results, fines as much as N100, 000.00 to a jail term of up to 21 years. The Act however remains a toothless bulldog. Cross River University of Technology stipulates a number of penalties such as rustication for academic session to expulsion to serve as deterrent to students,” they said.
