Best candidate in 2016 WAEC receives Oyediran’s award

THE best candidate in 2016 West African Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), Pius Kyere, on Tuesday, received the Augustus Bandele Oyediran Prize for excellence performance.

Professor A. B. O. O. Oyediran, who is the head of the Oyediran family, presented the award at the 65th Annual Council Meeting of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), in Abuja.

This came as President Muhammadu Buhari condemned the practice in the country where public servants and people of questionable wealth are celebrated with alumni recognitions, honorary degrees, chieftaincy titles and sometimes higher religious titles.

Speaking at the WAEC council meeting, President Buhari said integrity must be emphasised by institutions dishing out such awards to corrupt members of the society.Buhari, who was represented by Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, said Nigerians were no longer concerned about the process of attaining success, because the end justified the means.

“Today the attainment of wealth, power or educational influence is the mark of success, which is not necessarily a bad thing except we are no longer concerned with the process of attaining success.

“The end it appears today justifies the means which explains why cheating in exams and fake certificates simply do not generate the sort of outrage that such conduct would have generated years ago.

“Public servants and many in the private sectors who have questionable wealth are celebrated in one form or the other, alumni recognitions, honorary degrees, chieftaincy titles and even higher religious titles.

“Often, cheating is with the collusion of parents and teachers. This only reflects the failure of values in our larger society,” Buhari said.

The president called for a change in education curricula to reflect modern teaching methods.

“It is much more important today to emphasise how we should teach, which will obviously impact how we should examine, what questions we should be asking and what we should be looking for in our students.

“But regarding what we should teach, it is my respective view, more important now than ever before to redefine success,” he said.

Earlier in his remarks, Registrar to Council, WAEC, Dr Niyi Uwadiae, had said examination malpractices remained a major challenge for the council.

Uwadiae, who said the consequences of malpractices were grave, called for collaboration to tackle the scourge.

Minister of Education, Mallam Adamu Adamu, in his remarks, said the Federal Government had rolled out programmes to combat some of the challenges facing education in the country.

“Government has also entered into collaboration with several international development partners on these issues,” he said.