WASSCE: Lagos school to face sanctions for registering over 50 external candidates

Jibril Martin Memorial Grammar School, Iponri, Lagos is to face
sanctions for registering external candidates for the ongoing 2019
West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for
school candidates.

The school owned by the Anwar-Ul-Islam Movement of Nigeria, was
one of the mission schools returned by the Lagos State government
to their owners in 2001.

Director-General, Lagos State Office of Education Quality
Assurance, Mrs. Ronke Soyombo, who monitored the WASSCE English
paper on Thursday, discovered the school had 127 SS3 pupils on its
register compared to over 180 candidates presented for the
examination.

Some of the 18 external candidates her team physically
identified were SS3 pupils from public schools and unapproved
private schools or candidates retaking the examination some of who
were clearly over-aged.

Some of the candidates also came from far-flung places within
and outside Lagos – like Ilorin, Kwara State and Abia State.

Soyombo said registration of private candidates clearly
contravened the laws for WAEC school examination and was fertile
ground for perpetration of examination malpractice.

“For us to check your students today to see that they are not
your own bonafide students, that means you are not supposed to be
an approved school.

“There is a section in place in law that every approved school
must stick to their students alone. You are not supposed to condone
unapproved schools to be sending their wards to your school,” she
said to the school’s principal.

The DG said sanctions would be meted out after she reports the
case to the Deputy Government, Dr Idiat Adebule, who oversees the
Education sector.

Soyombo also said her office would conduct a whole-school
evaluation for the school because of lapses noted during the
visit.

She observed that the school allowed external people use its
facility as parking lot, which contravenes Lagos State School
safety and safeguarding laws; there was naked wire close to toilets
used by students in one of the blocks, the home economics
laboratory lacked facilities and was dumping ground for old
documents and the library had no furniture or books.

It was rather used to store old books and bags of packaged
water.

At the nearby Estate Senior High School, Iponri, a public
school, 80 candidates registered for English were all SS3 pupils of
the school.

The DG commended them from writing their examination in their
school rather than seeking miracle centres in private schools.

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