Tuesday, 11th February, 2025
Hon Bright Asamoah Brefo
Bibiani-Anhwiaso-Bekwai
Mr Speaker, I stand on Order 67(f)(f) and Order 93(1) of the Standing Orders to make a Statement on the delay in releasing West African Secondary School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) results.
Mr Speaker, before I proceed to make my Statement, I wish to give a brief background to what occasioned the delay. The West African Examinations Council (WAEC), as a regional examination body that conducts various exams in five English speaking West African countries, in a press release dated, 9th December, 2024, disclosed that delays in the release of funds from the Ministry of Education was affecting the timely completion of post-examination processes for the 2024 WASSCE—
Mr Speaker, WAEC further revealed that although the marking of essay and practical components were completed on November 20, 2024, the scanning of objective test cards had been stalled due to the breakdown of scanners. This delay was attributed to the lack of funds needed for repairs and other operational activities.
Mr Speaker, having highlighted on what occasioned the delay in the release of the WASSCE results, WAEC, on 30th December, 2024, released the provisional results of the 2024 WASSCE, with some 781 results being withheld, as a result of some alleged irregularities and examination malpractices. WAEC confirmed that, it was going to release the withheld results by February 28th , after investigations into the alleged malpractices have been finalised.
Mr Speaker, parents and affected students were invited by the WAEC, to answer questions on the withheld WASSCE results on January 30th, 2025. Mr Speaker, students from the Western North Region, of which my Constituency happened to be part, and had their results withheld, were asked to go to Sekondi, which is a different regional capital, with their parents. This decision by WAEC, for students and parents to move from one region to another, put so much stress and financial burden on them. This could have been done in their home regional capital, Sefwi Wiawso, where WAEC has a regional office.
Mr Speaker, on reaching Sekondi, affected students were instructed to enter a certain room, for questioning and writing of statements, without their parents, guardian or legal representation. This directive did not go down well with many parents, and led to an altercation between some parents of the affected students, and officials of WAEC. This led to the unfortunate death of Mr Joseph Agyemang, popularly known as Papa Bruno, an official of WAEC. May his soul rest in peace, and my condolences to his family.
Mr Speaker, is it rather not fair for students to be held responsible for the negligence of WAEC, in executing its duty of ensuring examinations are conducted in a fair and transparent manner, through its invigilators and examination officers on the day of the examination.
Mr Speaker, in a country where students are provided with past questions and answers as a study guide, would it not be obvious that students would have the same answers or similar answers where similar questions are put before them? In light of the foregoing, it is my candid view that it is unfair for WAEC to flag 319 schools for alleged collusion detected by examiners during script marking. The actions of WAEC led some affected candidates to mount a legal challenge in the High Court, which resulted in a ruling in their favour, and the High Court ordered WAEC to release the withheld results.
Mr Speaker, as I make this statement, I believe universities have closed admissions, and both parents of the affected students are in a state of confusion, with anxiety concerning what the future holds for their children. I am pleading with the Government, Ministry of Education, and WAEC, to look into the issue holistically, and resolve it as soon as possible, to prevent any miscarriage of justice. Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Hon Fred Kyei Asamoah
Offinso North
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the Statement.
As the just outgone Director-General for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET), I had the opportunity to supervise the examination of over 46,000 learners in this country for the TVET sector.
Mr Speaker, examination is not a way to punish students; but it is an opportunity to verify students' competence and to encourage learning within the school environment. Many a time, what happens is that either facilitators or in other words, teachers, are not teaching, or learners are not learning. As such, within the TVET sector, we devise a means of encouraging learning, and I believe it will be continued. That is randomisation and serialisation; this, we believe, is curbing examination malpractices.
But Mr Speaker, nobody likes examinations; even PhD students do not like to take it. So, examination malpractices would not be out of the system, but we can find a way to reduce it so that we improve on competence, as the learners are the ones that end up becoming practitioners.
Mr Speaker, it is quite unfortunate a lot of issues came out of the Statement. One had to do with delay in releasing examination results, and the other had to do with methodology or approach of conducting examinations. The last one had to do with examination malpractices, where some students need to be interviewed or heard.
Mr Speaker, every single year, one would realise that examination bodies do not release final results; but they would always release what we call “provisional results”. This is because one would anticipate that definitely, there could be some malpractices which one would want to improve on. As such, every student is allowed to come and explain themselves, either to deny or otherwise. So, in terms of having to bring students to answer some charges that have been levelled against them, it is something that is done across the world.
But I believe, maybe, if WAEC has the logistics, at least it can be done either on the regional level or at a district level. At the district level, it might be a little bit difficult looking at our infrastructure, but at least, at the regional level, it would be something that could be encouraged; so that we can curb the issue of the man who passed on, and the learners who had to travel a long way to one centre to be interrogated.
Mr Speaker, the world is changing. We are moving into the fifth industrial revolution, and in our quest to either randomise or serialise examinations, to bring down malpractices, I believe we may have to introduce digitisation into our examinations. This is because if one looks at other countries that have more students than we do in Ghana, they have introduced systems that are able to assess their learners to make sure that they learn, and not cheat. So, what we encourage WAEC to do, is to move from the normal analogue system, and digitise our examinations.
Mr Speaker, in that case, learners would be tailored to specific examination that would be individualised so we can reduce examination malpractices. Mr Speaker, one other difficulty that we tend to have is the release of funds and examination is not a one-day activity. It’s a process that starts and goes on with setting up examination questions, making sure these questions are validated, organising the examinations—And even after the examinations, we get the Chief Examiners to look at the results before they are even released. It’s a whole lot of processes that requires a lot of infrastructure, capacity and resources.
I believe that if we have WAEC and the Commission for Technical and Vocational Education and Training (CTVET) organise examinations for our second-cycle students in this country, this august House can make available through the Ministry of Education enough resources to organise these exams very well such that no student or learner would be disadvantaged. We can also put in measures that can encourage learning and facilitation so that our learners would be confident enough to be assessed and they would not find themselves colluding with other learners.
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity.
Hon Peter Kwasi Nortsu-Kotoe
Akatsi North
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the Statement made by my Colleague.
Mr Speaker, it is true that this year’s release of results for the 2024 WASSCE delayed because of the delay also in the release of funds to WAEC to conduct the marking and collation of the results on time and that was a big challenge last year.
The Minority Chief Whip was then the Majority Chief Whip—How we had to work together to make sure that money was even released for the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) so that it did not delay and we did the same for the WASSCE. At the time money was released to them, the examination was at hand and they needed a lot of logistics. Their equipment had broken down. So, they were finding it very difficult to meet the targeted day of release of the results.
Mr Speaker, examination malpractices have been the biggest challenge facing WAEC apart from funding. If one looks at the statistics, it has been on the increase. In 2018, the increase was 0.9 per cent. In 2023, it was 10.1 per cent. So, over the years, we are witnessing rampant increase in examination malpractices and there are a number of factors to this.
One of them is the league of schools after the release of WASSCE results. Schools are graded and they are given an order of merit so every school struggles to be in the first 10 or so on the league table. Because of that, school authorities also condone examination malpractices. If one visits schools during the WAEC examinations, one would realise that school authorities look on while students cheat in the examination. There are centres in this country where WAEC officials are even prevented from supervising or visiting examination centres and those schools had to be blacklisted by WAEC because there was no way they could go and supervise or see what was happening. The issue is more about morals. Because if we allow students to cheat in examinations, those of us who are to bring up these young ones are encouraging them to do so, WAEC would be in a very bad situation to carry out any measures that they want to carry out.
Another challenge they have is also about the Ministry of Education and the Ghana Education Service (GES) carrying out measures that would deter both students and teachers from collaborating in examination malpractices. At times, they are only admonished, cautioned or suspended for some time and then they go back to work and it is business as usual.
I think it is important that we ask the Ministry of Education to make sure that stringent measures are put in place to prevent students and teachers from conducting themselves in examination malpractices. The sanctions are not deterrent enough, so it is still giving encouragement and room to candidates to cheat in examination. WAEC has no power to prosecute those who are found or arrested during examination malpractices. They have to hand over the case to the police, it takes a long time for prosecution to take place, they are fined meagre sums of money, which they readily pay and go away scot free. These are some of the challenges and it is important that we take WAEC’s predicament seriously and see how best we can do for them.
Because of lack of funding, they are not able to go into digitalisation of their printing processes. During the last examination, they had a challenge with their equipment so everything broke down. If they had not been given money at a point in time, they would not have been able to even release the results. They need to be supported so that they can digitalise the system to ensure that whatever they need to do must receive the support of everybody.
Mr Speaker, we sympathise with the affected students and I am sure with my contact with WAEC, they would be able to release the remaining results within the shortest possible time. But what we also need to do as parents and leaders of the society, is to talk to our students to stick to their books. They should not expect leakages at the time of examination or what they call apor during the examination. It is important.
Mr Speaker, there is one thing we also need to do. We have to take a second look at assessing our students. Do we need to just go by the old method where at the end of three or four years, they sit down, write examination for three or four hours and they are awarded certificates? I think we need to take a second look at that also. There are different forms of assessment that I think we can adopt. If the percentage that would be required as written examination is reduced drastically, that desire to cheat in examination to make sure that, they get very good marks to make an A or a B, I think we would move away from that.
Mr Speaker, we sympathise with the students, but I can assure you that WAEC is doing everything possible to get the remaining results released as quickly as possible. This is because of lack of logistics and resources. Also, my information is that busing the candidates to the regional centres was even a very big challenge for WAEC because of lack of money. But I can assure thr House that this year, things would change.
As we speak, Government is indebted to WAEC to the tune of GH₵64 million; because of that, WAEC has not been able to pay some of the examiners, examination checkers and all those things. They are still owing them, and it is owing mechanics who work on their equipment, but we are sure that, going forward, things will be better than it had been.
Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Hon Nana Asafo-Adjei Ayeh
Bosome Freho
Thank you, Mr Speaker. Mr Speaker, I think it is important that we acknowledge the maker of the Statement and commend him for bringing such an important issue to the floor of Parliament to be discussed.
Mr Speaker, many a time, we look at the decisions or measures that have been taken by the WAEC, which I agree; it is important. But we cannot deal with this matter without critically looking at the issues that are confronting WAEC, Ghana, students and all of them. We critically have—And I would suggest, after this deliberation on this matter, in an era where it is easy for committees to be formed, the President should form a committee to, as a matter of fact, look into this matter because it is very pertinent.
Mr Speaker, one of the major issues that we need to look at is a certain foreknowledge that the students and the teachers seem to get ahead of the examination. There is a certain attitude: when one gets to the examination centre, it is not just students who are cheating, but supervisors are aiding students to perpetuate that act. It is also important because, sometimes, one would find proprietors, headmasters, and teachers of various institutions trying to make ways and means for their students. Why are these things going on? It is going on because there is a certain social status and social impression about the grades the school would come out with. It is important because they are looking at that as a source of getting students into their schools.
Mr Speaker, we cannot deal with this matter without looking at GES, and WAEC and its internal control mechanisms. There are times that some of these questions come from the internal systems of WAEC. Yes, we agree; they might have challenges of funding, but I do not think challenges of funding must necessarily be a way or a means to give students a leeway to have their way at the examination centres.
Mr Speaker, I am pleading and I am asking that beyond the Statement and comments, a measure, a committee, or a team must be put in place, so that— Every year when students go to write the examination and come back, it is either examination provisional results are held, or results of students have been cancelled.
Mr Speaker, we need to find a lasting solution to this matter, and we cannot do that without engaging the stakeholders. Precisely, WAEC, GES and other stakeholders that matter. One of my Hon Colleagues made a comment that WAEC does not even have the mandate or the powers to even do an investigation and prosecution. We need to revisit this issue, whether there should be an Act for them, a law that would embolden and strengthen them, so that some of these measures can be worked on.
Mr Speaker, I will commend the maker of the Statement, but the students are still waiting for their results. Schools have reopened, and others are moving forward. Before you know, the delay of their results would affect their progress in school. Let us not just end the Statement here; let us move forward and set up a committee, so that these matters will be looked into and a lasting solution would be found to deal with and address this matter.
Mr Speaker, with these few words, I would like to thank you for the opportunity given me.
Hon John Kwame Adu Jack
Dormaa Central
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity given to me.
Mr Speaker, I am a teacher, so, sometimes, issues of examination malpractice is serious, and we need to tackle it from all angles. In the university, when one meets students and look at their output, the only thing we could do is to find out what actually happened before they got to the university. Checking from the background, I know that although from time immemorial exam malpractice has been a problem, lately, it is becoming too astronomical, and we need to find out what actually is happening.
Mr Speaker, one of the things that we need to look at is the Free Senior High School (SHS) programme. Because when we decided to ask some of these headmasters from various schools, what we got from them was that no student fails. I do not know if because of the Free SHS every student has been budgeted to complete within four years, so how much to be spent on each student goes along with that student up to the three years, so nobody fails in the examination, and they move through. That is one of the major problems why, at the end of the day, students who are even not good are in the third year, and they need to write examination. At all costs, the parent wants the child or the student to pass, and the student himself or herself wants to pass.
Mr Speaker, so what happens? They now go to any tangent to be able to pass. So, I am of the opinion that if we want to curb this, we need to look at that programme very well, so that we sit up and do what we used to do when we were all in school. If a student fails in any examination from first year, he or she would not progress to the next point. If we are able to do that, I think that we would be able to curb or, at least reduce, what we are experiencing now. Other than that, we would be talking, but would not be able to get the actual input that brings that kind of output.
Mr Speaker, if one looks at it again, students have written examination and it is assumed or it is said that they have copied so the results of their examination are withheld, the point is that were they supervised during the examinations? If there was actual supervision, who were the culprits? If they had copied, it means that those who were asked to supervise that exams are also culprits. Have we done anything about this?
Mr Speaker, so if we are not able to bring stringent punishment to these people who also have been given monies to supervise these examinations, it would definitely continue because nobody would want their child or ward to fail in an examination, and they will go to any length to do it.
Mr Speaker, thank you very much for the opportunity given me
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