WAEC to use legal action to check examination malpractice

Accra, Nov. 5, GNA - The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) will continue to use all legal means to clamp down on examination malpractices to protect the credibility of its certificates.

Mrs Agnes N. Teye-Cudjoe, the Principal Public Affairs Officer of the Council, told the Ghana News Agency on Friday in an interview in Accra that WAEC would not relent in implementing innovative measures aimed at monitoring, reporting and exposing perpetrators of examination malpractices.

Mrs Teye-Cudjoe gave the assurance that the Council was committed to tightening its security measures to check examination leakage. Speaking on the publication of the names and photographs of candidates who engaged in examination malpractices, she said the objective was to "name and shame" perpetrators to discourage the act.

Mrs Teye-Cudjoe said some institutions, including the Parliamentary Select Committee on Education, had commended the Council for publishing the names of candidates who engaged in examination malpractices. She blamed students, who did not want to learn but desired good grades, as well as some parents and school authorities, for examination corruption.

As a long-term solution she called on the public to develop what she described as "public-spiritedness" to eradicate the malady from the Ghanaian society.

She said invigilators needed to do their work very well at the various examination centres, adding that they ought to have in mind that a lax attitude during invigilation did no good to the students. "Invigilators, teachers, students, parents, school authorities and the media should be involved in the fight. We need public-spirited people in the society," she said.