Time for a Change? Why WAEC Needs a Total Reset in Nigeria’s Education System
The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) desperately needs a makeover after 73 years in operation. The difficulties that certain centers’ applicants encountered during the 2024–2025 Senior School Certificate Examinations point to a concerning downturn at WAEC and call for a thorough reorganization of its business practices.
Four days before the test, the English Language question paper was leaked, forcing the council to redo the questions. As a result, candidates sat up late to take the test. Students used candles, torches, and any other available light source when the lights went out. A roof at one center almost fell on some of the applicants.
Many households were rocked by the scenario, with distressed guardians and parents calling frantically to inquire about the location and safety of their loved ones. The event, which impacted centers in Lagos, Ogun, Osun, and Taraba, is apparently the subject of a police probe into certain WAEC personnel.
To administer exams in Nigeria and four other English-speaking West African nations—Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and The Gambia—WAEC was founded in 1952. Its goal is to provide diplomas that are as reliable as those issued by other examining organizations across the world.
For almost 20 years following its founding, the organization fulfilled its promises. Unquestionably, the tests shaped the lives of millions of people who went on to become professionals, national leaders, and international celebrities in a variety of disciplines.
But in the years that followed, the weaknesses of the subregional body were exposed. Days before the test, officials started selling question papers for a price, and dishonest businesspeople, traveling salespeople, and slothful students quickly snatched them up. This jeopardizes the integrity of WAEC’s credentials and undercuts the high standards it once held.
The corruption in the nation’s educational system is further highlighted by recent occurrences. Thousands of UTME applicants in six states and parts of Lagos were compelled to retake the exam due to a JAMB system failure that resulted in poor results just one month before the WASSCE leak.
An impacted female candidate committed suicide in Lagos as a result of her shock and frustration, and JAMB eventually acknowledged that it was its fault—not the candidates’—for the widespread failure.
The decline of WAEC underwent a sea change in the 1970s. Exams at some centers were canceled as a result of the Owosho Scandal, in which an official gave pupils answer slips ahead of time. Both guilty and innocent applicants were forced to retake the exam the following year with their juniors. But in every way, the 1977 compromise—known as “Expo ’77″—overshadowed the Owosho breach.
Despite WAEC’s optimism, exam leaks have caused irreparable harm to Nigerian credentials and educational advancement. The council held its 50th anniversary celebration in Abuja in March 2002 with the theme “50 Years of Excellence.”
The organization has “developed a team of well-trained and motivated staff, and administered examinations that are valid and relevant to the educational aspirations of member countries,” according to a 2004 statement made by a former leader of the organization in Nigeria.
However, as exam fraud and leaks increase on the internet and social media age, such assertions seem flimsy. For a charge, students visit a variety of websites and platforms that provide both authentic and fraudulent SSCE questions and answers; some of these sites blatantly refer to themselves as “King of Exam Runs.”
Additionally, there are “special exam centers” where applicants rarely fail. A mother is accused of organizing thugs to attack a school vice-principal at an Akure center during the current WASSCE because she forbade her son from using his phone in the exam room.
WAEC needs to make amends by closing the gaps that allow dishonest employees to distribute its test questions. The bad eggs must be located and turned over to the police so they can be prosecuted.
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