Friday, June 19, 2015

WAEC BOSS MUST GO-NAGRAT

By William Yaw Owusu
Friday, June 19, 2015

The National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT) has called for the resignation of the Very Rev. Sam Nii Nmai Ollennu, Head of the Ghana National Office of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) following the leakage and subsequent cancellation of some Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) papers.

The association also suggested the dissolution of the entire WAEC Board.
Ghanaians were on Wednesday hit with disturbing news of a massive leakage of five of the ongoing BECE subject papers and WAEC immediately took responsibility for the lapse and announced the cancellation of the affected subjects which would have to be re-written by the students.

The canceled papers were: English Language 2, Religious and Moral Education 2, Integrated Science 2, Mathematics 2 and Social Studies 2.

WAEC Admission
Deputy Director of Public Affairs of WAEC, Agnes Teye-Cudjoe, admitted in a statement that it was ‘dismayed’ and ‘disappointed’ that the papers had been compromised and explained that it had to cancel the papers in order to protect the integrity of the examination.

The council is presently being investigated by the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI).

Investigation
In the ensuing confusion, NAGRAT is blaming WAEC for the leakage and insisted it was necessary for the Rev. Ollennu to step aside because his continuous presence as the Council’s head will influence the investigation process.

At a news conference in Accra yesterday, Angel Kabonu, vice-President of NAGRAT said “When papers leak and the questions are on the internet, whatsApp and students could email them, then we will have to ask ourselves the question ‘where is it coming from’, definitely it is coming from WAEC”.

In NAGRAT’s view that WAEC let down Ghanaian teachers and students by failing to “bring WAEC up to speed with 21st century virtual securities.”

“We need to get beyond announcing the leakage and cancelling papers and really get into a process of house cleaning at WAEC, they really need to clean their house because clearly, individuals within that organisation are causing these leakages.”

WAEC is untouchable
According to NAGRAT, “WAEC is able to afford these unpardonable in inefficiencies because of the monopoly it enjoys.”

 “It is clear that whether their services are good or not and whether we like them or not, they are the only one we have. WAEC has become an untouchable bully that pushes bad services down our throat while no one dare questions them.”

NAGRAT admitted that “some pupils, students, teachers and indeed anybody could be culpable for leakages” but added that it is certain that “most of the leakages take their source from WAEC itself.”

“It is unfortunate that WAEC staff are highly insulated and hardly suffer any serious penalties from their wrong doings.” They added that any WAEC official, teacher or pupil who is found culpable must be dealt with according to the law.”

Rippling effect
“the results that students churn out is a reflection of our competence or otherwise and if people are adamant to our call…because our call does not stem from only what has happened this year, we have series of historical developments that we will present to the table, if that is not done we will have to reconsider our relationship with that examination body.

“Don’t forget the questions are from us, the assessment and marking of the examination is from us, we invigilate the examination and without us the examination cannot go on,” NAGRAT said.

The June 2015 BECE started only on Monday, June 15 and was expected to be completed on today.  Some 438,030 candidates were registered to partake in the examinations in 1,446 centres across the length and breadth of the country.







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