Africa Education Watch has petitioned the Education Minister over the delay in the release of withheld results of some candidates who sat for the 2020 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE).
The group says such delays have in the past prevented candidates from advancing to tertiary institutions due to what they say is the West African Examination Council’s (WAEC) “own inefficiencies.”
“In order not to deny the affected 60,000 candidates their right to enroll in tertiary institutions in the 2020/21 academic year, as was the case last year, we are appealing to you to intervene by ensuring WAEC releases the said results in real-time, to enable those who will eventually qualify for tertiary admissions in the 2020/21 academic year to progress in January 2021”, the petition said.
In advancing its argument, the think tank cited 2019 when WAEC initially withheld the results of over 45,000 students under similar pretext but cleared many of the candidates of the alleged malpractice and released the results only after the closure of admissions to tertiary institutions.
“While we support the scrutiny of scripts to ascertain suspicions of examination malpractices, we are vehemently against the unjustified delays in the investigative process, to the extent that innocent candidates are eventually denied their right to enrol in a tertiary institution in the year of examination due to WAEC’s own inefficiencies”, the think tank argued.
WAEC released the 2020 WASSCE last Friday where it cancelled the subject results of 2,383 candidates.
This, WAEC explained, is as a result of alleged examination malpractices by those candidates.
Additionally, the entire results of 480 candidates were cancelled for bringing mobile phones to the examination hall.
In the meantime, scripts of candidates from 122 schools in certain subjects are undergoing scrutiny.
All withheld results of candidates may be cancelled or released based on the outcome of the investigations, according to WAEC.
