In this interview on Channels Television?s Sunrise Daily programme, the National President of the National Association of Proprietors of Private Schools (NAPPS) in Nigeria, Dr Yomi Otubela, decried the extent of the failure in the recently released 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) results.

Excerpts:

You hear stuff about the results being out, the results are not out. Help us understand what exactly is happening.

The West African Examination Council (WAEC) just released the 2025 examination results, but for some time, candidates and parents faced challenges accessing them on the internet and the website.

Later in the evening on that same day, candidates started assessing their results without any hitch. Thereafter, there was a list made about schools allegedly indicted in the examination for their children to have committed some act of malpractice and a day after, there was a release from WAEC that such information about those allegedly indicted in examination practices never originated from the council. The council further supported their claim that there is no way a school will have come before the investigation panel committee with the script of the children, knowing well that the script is in favour with the council.

So, that made the statement a false statement to start with. Back to the WAEC result itself, the results, according to the Head of the National Office, WAEC, had reported that the students passed at about 38%, which is the worst for about 15 years from 2015 to date, where the list before then was put at 39 or thereabouts.

The reason for this cannot be far-fetched from the fact that there are a lot of challenges that are facing the education of our country, as it affects the students writing their final year examination. Top of the list of these challenges is the fact that we have not paid sufficient attention to the capacity building of our teachers. In a few months, we shall be celebrating World Teachers Day.

For about two years now, not much has been done to see that the teacher?s capacity building has gone to a level that could assist the teachers to play the mentoring role in the lives of the children.

Aside from this is that, you agree with me that the budgetary allocation falls short of the recommended percentage by UNESCO to education. We also have issues that relate to infrastructure and digital accessibility, especially in rural areas where children hardly have access to a computer and where they are, it is just about 1 to 100. And we still have some of these children who are studying in an atmosphere that is not conducive to learning. This then points to the fact that there is a whole lot of gap between what is going on in the class and the outcome for the children.

Just recently, a school director announced plans to protest because the English language subject did not accurately reflect the students? performance, despite their good scores in other subjects. Do you have a similar experience?

We have received concerns from members of our associations who believe that the recent examination results do not accurately reflect the abilities of some children. WAEC (West African Examinations Council) has a process in place to address such concerns, allowing individuals to apply for a review of a child?s exam script.

We have encouraged our members to utilise this option and ensure applications are made for the reconsideration of the scripts of children we can confidently support.

Additionally, we cannot ignore the fact that the conditions under which some students took the exams in certain states were unacceptable. For example, children who were forced to write exams late into the night using candles or torches cannot be set as a standard for attaining commendable results.

Therefore, I want to commend the children who have overcome these hardships?particularly economic challenges?and still achieved commendable results.

Should we declare a state of emergency in education to protect the future?

Yes, the current Minister of Education had taken the bull by the horn by ensuring that some policies are pushed outside there to confront these challenges, some of which he has challenged the body in charge of registration of teachers ? Registration Council ? to ensure that no teachers, nobody, no personality, no officer that has not been verified by the TRCN is allowed to interface with these children, and I would not agree less knowing that whatever goes in is what comes out of a woman.

As a man thinketh, so he is; so we cannot raise children who have to struggle to pass the examination without adequate facilities. We cannot expect much from them.

It is what we give to them that will come out of them in many years to come. Suffice to say that what is coming out currently has started some 30 years back, and except we take drastic action to correct that, we shall continue to have these challenges, and it may be worse. But for the fact that the current minister has shown capacity, has shown tenacity, I?m not in doubt that there will be some quick changes in the years to come.

It appears that no standards are ensuring these schools meet at least the minimum international criteria necessary to secure the future. What?s your take on that?

Yes, you know that putting up policies that will ensure standards is not as important as monitoring and implementing such policies. The challenges we have in Nigeria are not about the provision of policies that can take us to the world level. It is the ability to implement these policies without fear or favour.

In times we have seen where challenges have been seen and the monitoring team has observed a shortfall in policy implementation, and no drastic action has been taken. And for those schools that were listed out there, I?ve said it earlier on, I want to reiterate this, that those lists are not facts, they are not true. We are expecting the true list from WAEC, if there is any.

The public should discountenance that, as we have interacted with WAEC over that, and no such list exists. And for schools that are running short of the standard of the policy of education, we want to challenge the policymakers who are in charge of implementation to buckle up their shoes and ensure that the monitoring and supervising department is up to the game. (Channels TV)

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