With the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for school candidates scheduled to hold from May 16 to June 23, no candidate from public schools in Zamfara and Sokoto states will be sitting for the exam.
Head of the Nigeria National Office of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), Mr. Patrick Areghan made the announcement on Monday, May 9, while addressing newsmen on the council’s preparations and readiness for the conduct of the examination in Nigeria.
Areghan noted that while private schools in the states had registered their candidates for the examination, “the reason why candidates from public schools were not registered remains unknown.”
The WAEC chief also frowned at late registration of candidates, particularly by private schools, saying, such act is totally unacceptable as it delays preparations for the examination.
Over 1.6 million candidates from 20,221 schools have registered for the examination out of which 800,055 (49.76%) are males while 800,724 representing 50.24% are females.
The candidates would be examined in 76 subjects, made up of 197 papers while about 30,000 practising senior teachers, nominated by various Ministries of Education, would be participating in the examination as supervisors.
Though National Identification Number (NIN) was made a component of the registration process; it was not a compulsory requirement in order not to disqualify many candidates.
Parents and guardians were urged to admonish their wards to study hard and desist from any form of examination malpractice by the exam body which also warned supervisors to desist from aiding and abetting examination malpractice by assisting candidates, especially by allowing them to enter the Examination Hall with their cell phones and make use of same.
