Why Bayelsa Ranked Low in NECO Results—State Government Explains Shocking Drop

The Bayelsa State Government claims that low registration rates, not subpar academic achievement, are to blame for the low performance rating of the state’s candidates who took the National Examination Council’s (NECO) internal exam in 2024.

NECO had on Tuesday disclosed the performance of all the candidates in each state of the country, including some West African countries such as the Niger Republic, Cote D’Ivoire, the Benin Republic, Togo, and Equatorial Guinea, where Bayelsa was rated 36.

Reacting to the public censure on the Bayelsa State performance in the test, the state Commissioner for Education, Dr. Gentle Emelah, said the recent ranking by NECO did not suggest that students from the state scored poorly, but it was mostly caused by low registration.
Emelah, in a statement via his media assistant, Mr. Onisoman Kos-Ikah, on Wednesday, asked parents in the state to encourage their wards to register for NECO, calling it Nigeria’s foremost examination organization that should be emphasized.

“The claims that Bayelsa State has been poorly ranked by the National Education Council (NECO) are untrue. The performance was not due to poor academic performance but rather to low registration of candidates,” he said. Verifiable statistics on the said document trending online show that 6,961 candidates registered for the 2024 examinations, while 6,876 candidates sat for the examination. Of this number, 4,633 were from public schools and 2,243 were from private schools. The ranking of Bayelsa State in the 2024 NECO SSCE Examination was due to low registration, as is evident from the analytical breakdown of the results below:

“Just 1,699 students received less than five credits, which is by no means a poor performance; 5,177 students received five credits or more, including in mathematics and English language.” According to the report, Bayelsa registered 6876 candidates, while other states registered up to 147,000.

Recall that to improve enrollment and fortify ties with the state, NECO Registrar Prof. Dantami Ibrahim Wushishi personally visited Bayelsa State on July 11, 2024. Because the data is not properly understood by individuals attempting to evaluate it on social media, Bayelsans are politely advised to ignore the misinformation.