(By Vanguard)
National Examinations Council, NECO, has released the 2015 Senior School Certificate Examination, SSCE, with candidates scoring 68.56 percent with five credits and above, including English Language and Mathematics, which is an appreciable improvement over the past, especially last year’s result.
A total number of 975,991 registered for the various examinations out of which 969,491 sat for the papers with 664,747 or 68.56 percent passing with five credits and above; in 2014, by comparison, 978,886 sat for the examinations with 511,931 or 52.29 percent passing with five credits and above.
The new Registrar/Chief Executive of NECO, Professor Abdulrashid Garba, who announced the release at Council’s head Office, Minna Thursday, said the results were an improvement of 12 percent compared to that of last year.
Centres de-recognized
He remarked that though the NECO examinations were not completely devoid of malpractices in some centres and schools, where such cases were established, results of such schools or centres were either withheld or cancelled, while those apprehended will also be prosecuted to show the council’s zero tolerance for examination malpractices and add credibility to the examinations in future.
Professor Garba stated that besides the cancellation, the centres and schools already established to be involved in the malpractices, had been de-recognized indefinitely, while some were suspended or totally de-recognized.
Seven centres across the country have been discovered and sanctioned accordingly.
He said already, some of the ad hoc staff linked to any form of malpractice or for other negligence had also been disengaged from the services of the council.
On debtor states
The Registrar, while answering questions on debtor states, said results of such schools were being withheld and would be released if commitments were shown by the affected schools.
Garba said: “t is not only government schools that owe. I can tell you that only 13 schools, including private schools, owe us and already most of them are showing commitments to settle and we will release such results once we reach an agreement.”
He attributed the considerable improvement in this year’s results to the commitment of various governments at all levels to the funding education and NECO’s curriculum, which he described as more “indigenous and homely.”
