By Adewale Ishola
All papers in the ongoing Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (2021 SSCE) conducted by the National Examination Council (NECO) are seen by many candidates across the country, hours before the start of these papers. Since the examinations started on July 5, 2021, the leaked papers including the solutions to the questions have been distributed in many states openly on many digital and internet platforms just as top officials of the Federal Ministry of Education and NECO continue to affirm the integrity of the Examinations and the fool-proof nature of distributing the examination papers across the states.
Today Monday, August 9, 2021, the two Mathematics Papers are scheduled to be taken by the candidates. Paper III: Objective – General Mathematics, is scheduled for 10:00 am – 11:45 am; while Paper II: Essay – General Mathematics is scheduled for 12:00noon – 2:30 pm. These papers’ questions and their answers have been flying around Nigeria since around 11.00 pm Sunday, August 8, 2021. (a copy in the text of this story).
These questions and answers and those of the papers of NECO and even those of the West African examinations Council (WAEC)’s West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examinations (WASSCE) are readily available to candidates. These illegal releases of these papers have been ongoing in the country for the past five years.
Yet officials of the Federal Ministry of Education, NECO and WAEC are claiming ignorance of this illegal practice in the Nigerian educational space. What is so shocking is that the syndicates involved are expanding their distribution network, advertising such brazenly on the websites of Nigerian national daily newspapers and Facebook.
The leakage methods
Investigations by The educational Tide revealed that key staff of the NECO and WAEC are behind this massive leakage of the Senior Secondary School (SSS) exit examinations conducted by the two examination bodies.
The staff, working in conjunction with some ad-hoc staff of NECO and WAEC; some unscrupulous ‘educational consultants’ push these leaked papers and their answers to candidates, school owners, ‘runz/expo’ consultants and some education-related websites.
How candidates get a copy of these ‘expos’ is usually determined by the greed of the distributors so involved. Even sometimes, some of these desperate candidates fall into the hands of conmen who collect gratifications from them and do not give them access to the leaked questions or gave them fake ones.
Investigations revealed that the starting point of the syndicates’ operations is when NECO starts the distribution of these question papers to its custodian centres across the nation for the daily distribution to the examination centres. At the custodian centres, these booklets of examination papers are tampered with by the NECO officials working in cohort with the centres’ security officials (that night) and some ad-hoc officials (next morning).
Once a paper envelope is slit open one or two papers are pulled out and photocopied or photographed, depending on available resources. These are returned and the booklets are sealed back. These ‘special’ paper envelopes will be given to the trusted ad-hoc staff the next morning. His/her task is to disregard the tampering of the envelope, take them to the respective examination centres where it was scheduled to the taken. At the examination centre, the ad-hoc staff passed it on as being intact.
Once the question gets into the hands of the syndicate, it is swiftly processed using various means, including sending through WhatsApp messages to the main distributors, who then pass them forward to the nest line of actors.
Also, these questions are leaked at the examination bodies’ central distribution centres, using the same process of something slightly different
The distribution system
After the leaked questions are passed on to the ‘wholesale’ operators, the ‘sub-distributors and ‘retailers’, who have been rearing to take over swing into action. They work swiftly overnight, either working out the solutions to the questions or passing the questions down the chain or both depending on their scale of operation until it gets to the candidates. The target is to let the students get the questions alone or with the answers latest midnight of the day of that paper.
Interestingly, the retailers sometimes let the candidates have the questions and the answers free of charge, especially if he is an education consultant with a website that has heavy traffic (he gets his revenue from other sources, including adverts on the website).
However, some charges fees, ranging from tokens of recharge cards to cash in thousands of Naira. Some also require and demand that the candidate belongs to their close WhatsApp or Facebook groups,
Some of these groups have codes of silence subscribers are expected to agree with, while some are just open-ended operations.
Some of the popular websites that are used for the distribution of these ‘expos’ include obscure and popular well-respected sites like www.runsloaded.com.ng; www.nairaland.com; www.pagalguy.com; www.examsub.net; www.pinterest.com; www.joberplanet.com; www.noniwap.com.ng; www.lasu-info.com; www.legitexpo.com.ng; and www.unn-edu.info.
Interestingly some of the pages on these sites are just adverting sections as the syndicates strategically use popular and credible websites to distribute and advertise their ‘runz’ businesses. What The Educational Tide could not readily determine is whether the owners of these sites know about these nefarious activities being advertised.
On Facebook, popular pages for the ‘runz’ business are Free JAMB Cbt, Waec, Neco RUNZ; Waec 2020/2021 questions and answers; WAEC EXPO LINK; 2021 Best Jamb Expo, Waec Expo/Runz, Neco Expo, Nabteb Expo & Exam Updates; Waec and Neco 2020 Best runs And Expo – surebet; Wassce, neco,gce examination expo by stonner; ExamClassic.com; 2021/2022 Waec Expo/runz & Questions and Answers; 2021 Waec WhatsApp group; 2021/2022 Waec Expo/runz & Questions and Answers; 2021 Waec Expo, 2021/2020 Waec Expo, 2021 Waec Questions and Answers; 2022 Waec Expo/runz & Questions and Answers; 2021 Waec Expo. 2021/2022; 2021/2022 Waec Expo/runz & Questions and Answers
One of the popular Whatsapp operators is an Examrunz Whatsapp (V.i.p) Group. With N800 MTN recharge card, you get access to both questions and answers while with just MTN N500, you get only the questions.
NECO and Ministry reactions
While these illegal acts are done in the open, both the NECO and Federal Ministry of Education, and even WAEC appear to be helpless or inactive to combat these syndicates that are headed by their staff.
After a series of phone calls and WhatsApp messages, Sanni Azeez, NECO’s Head of Public Affairs, enumerated the system in place to guaranty the integrity of the ongoing 2021 SSCE examination.
“The Council has put in place several measures to check exam malpractice, among which are 1) Use of biometric data device to capture the fingerprints of candidates at exam centres to prevent impersonation 2) Use of Customized answer booklet for the Essay component of our exam 3) Daily distribution of sensitive exam materials to prevent leakages 4) Deployment of very senior officers of the Council as well as lectures of tertiary institutions to monitor our exams in all the centres and 4) Deployment of security agents to exam centres.”
When asked about the leakages of the examinations, he said he was not aware of that and tuned off but not before boasting that ‘with these measures put in place, we expect our exam to be fraud-proof. We have rules of engagements for both permanent and ad-hoc staff, which they must adhere strictly to and there are sanctions and penalties.’
Architect Sonny Echono, Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Education, at the end of a monitoring exercise carried out at Government Secondary School, Garki, and Federal Government Boys College, Apo, on Thursday, in Abuja, expressed satisfaction with the level of improvement in the conduct of examinations in the country.
“Clealy, NECO has gotten a full grip and hand on the process. We are impressed with the progress recorded across the country. We are also pleased with the measures taken to curtail incidences of examination malpractices.
“On our side, we ensure that we put the people in the right places. The credibility of our exams are ensured, we have improved on the process; integrity and credibility of our exams are upheld across the country,” he said.
On his part, Mr Ben Bem Goong, Director, Press and Public Relations of the ministry told The Educational Tide that any enquiry on leaked examinations papers should be directed to NECO as the agency was solely in charge of the operations related to the conduct of the exams, while the ministry only takes charge of the policy in the education sector. He said the ministry officials only comments on the operational issues to the extent of the information available to them at the time of such comments.
“The ministry takes responsibility for policies and supervision. So when you have an operational issue it should be directed to the agencies in charge of that operations. You should know the demarcation. You should not ask a ministry official a field,” he said.
And so those who are aware of the mass leakages of examinations in the Nigerian educational sector continue to wonder who will take the bull by the horn and confront this hydra-headed monster.
