The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has withheld the subject results of 1,298 candidates who sat the 2017 Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).

The figure represents 0.28% of the total candidature who wrote the examination.

“This excludes the subject results of candidates who were detected by the Item Differentia Profile (IDP) software to have cheated in the objective tests,” a statement signed by the Public Affairs Director of WAEC Mrs Agnes Teye-Cudjoe explained.

She added: “The withheld results will be released after the conclusion of investigations into various cases of examination malpractice detected during and after the conduct of the examination.”

“The Council takes this opportunity to advise candidates to do independent work in the examination hall and to avoid seeking any form of illegal assistance as such acts would be detected and sanctions applied accordingly,” the statement stressed.

A total of 468,060 candidates made up of 241,154 males and 226,906 females sat for the examination. The figure is 1.53% higher than that of the previous year.

The candidates were from a total of 15,185 schools and the examination was administered at 1,702 centres. Out of those who initially registered for the examination, 3,315 (0.71%) of the candidates were absent.

WAEC said it has released provisional results of candidates – 25 days earlier than last year.

“The Council is in the process of dispatching the results to the schools through the Municipal/District Directors of Education.

“Meanwhile the Council has hosted the results online and candidates who so desire may access their results online at the Council’s website,” the statement added.