WAEC bans Imo schools where officials were ‘locked out’, supervisor assaulted

Two secondary schools in Imo state have been barred from registering as examination centres for the West African Examinations Council (WAEC).

The schools have also been barred from presenting their pupils as candidates in any of its examinations for a period of five years.

Demianus Ojijeogu, head, Public Affairs, WAEC, revealed this to Punch on Thursday but declined to name the affected schools.

Ojijeogu noted that a supervisor was assaulted in one of the Imo schools while WAEC officials were “locked out for more than 30 minutes in the second school obviously to perpetrate examination malpractice”.

He said: “We don’t usually name the schools because we refer to them by their centre numbers. For the derecognised schools, examination can still hold in the school but we will not use their teachers as invigilator.

“There are 28 of those schools across the country and they can still reapply after two years, telling us what they have put in place to prevent a recurrence of examination malpractice.”

The Nigeria Examinations Committee (NEC) of the WAEC recently approved recommended sanctions for cases of exam malpractice.

A communique was issued to this effect at the end of the 62nd meeting of NEC WAEC held in Lagos.

According to the communique, the recommendations of the committee should be implemented without delay.