Members of the House of Representatives Committee on Basic Education and Examination Bodies expressed their dissatisfaction on Monday, urging the embattled Registrar of the West African Examination Council (WAEC), Dr. Amos Dangut, to resign immediately.
This demand was prompted by the controversy surrounding the conduct of the Senior Secondary Certification Examination (SSCE) in several states across the federation.
During the resumed investigative hearing regarding the public outcry over the nationwide examination, lawmakers Hon. Bolt Osawuru and Hon. Amobi Ogah voiced their disagreement with the WAEC Registrar’s attempts to explain away the issues involving the compromised examination papers produced by outsourced printers.
Speaking earlier, Dr. Dangut who apologised to Nigerians for the unpalatable experience witnessed by the Students in some parts of the country, affirmed that efforts were made three days to salvage the compromised examination.
He said: “My being away was very critical in ensuring that order is restored in the future papers, and that explains why I was not here. It was not for any other reason, and I thank you for your understanding, which have allowed us to put our house in order. Thank you very much.
“The events that led to that unfortunate situation started just about three days to the conduct of that examination. We were given what looked to be a compromised examination, and we swung into action, knowing the implication of having a compromised examination. Now, we went into the drawing board. We looked at strategies, and we strategized to ensure that the paper was not compromised.
“I want to inform you and Nigerians that we were able to achieve that, but unfortunately, much regretted, it opened up another problem, and that problem was the late commencement of the examination.”
Yet unsatisfied with his explanation, Hon. Abiante who fired the first shot at the WAEC Registrar, asked him series of questions, saying: “Please, don’t be angry with me or make the question look stupid. Just tell me it’s a very stupid question and you cannot answer me. “Did you write WAEC, sir? I did. What year, sir?
When asked to cite example of any west African countries where exams are conducted at midnight, Dr. Dangut said: “I am not aware of any to the best of my knowledge.”
While the lawmakers argued that Nigeria has failed in the conduct of SSCE due to logistics challenges and incapacitated workforce and whether the results of the examinations written under the condition will be adjusted to the credible or not, Dr. Dangut said: “The result will come from the examiners, now it is assumed yes. Oh, they are credible.”
Speaking further on the challenges faced during the examination, Dr. Dangut said: “We had three major causes for the delay. The first one was logistics.
“The vehicle conveying the exam material to Taraba had faults in the night because we had to travel overnight because of the time required to replace the papers. Then, in another part, our vehicle was not allowed to pass the community.”
Despite repeated questions on the credibility of the examination and video clips of taken at some of the centres, the WAEC Registrar maintained that: “Nationally, it was a credible exam.”
While speaking, Hon. Oforji said: “Well, head of WAEC, the issue of resignation is a matter of morality. It’s a matter of morality. We all knew you decided to toe the side of that is personal. It’s a matter of morality.
“However, Nigerians are not happy what happened within this example. And I know that even the this government that is also doing their bit in the educational sector, nobody is pleased. And I appreciate the fact that you identify and recognize and accept.
“You also did accept that all was not well, or all is not well, that all is not well. However, it is our expectation that this will not repeat itself. It is our expectation that this will not repeat itself.
“Nigeria will not be able to welcome this type of ugly trend, ugly situation in our educational sector. If you look at the level of how many millions of Nigerians that carry out this exam? How many millions? 1.9 million Nigerians sat for this exam.”
The lawmakers also undesired the need to organise national conference where stakeholders will deliberate on the validity of CBT examination in 2026 considering the fact that most local government areas lack requisite infrastructure including electricity.
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