The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) on Thursday, August 7, acknowledged errors in the released results of the May/June 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) and has begun the process to review the results.
The council confirmed In a statement that a review would be carried out in four core subjects: Mathematics, English Language, Biology, and Economics.
WAEC released the results of the school examination, taken by 1,969,313 candidates across 23,554 secondary schools, on Monday, August 4, 2025. Only 754,545 candidates, representing 38.32%, obtained credits and above in a minimum of five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics, marking a 33.8% decline in performance compared to the 72.12% recorded in 2024.
The poor performance led to a public outcry, with some stakeholders demanding the outright cancellation of the WASSCE results, while a federal lawmaker urged the council to release the withheld results of 192,089 candidates, representing 9.75% of the total, due to alleged examination malpractice.
In a statement signed by the acting Public Affairs Officer, Mrs Moyosola Adesina, WAEC said it “sincerely regrets to inform the general public of technical issues discovered during the internal review of the recently released results of WASSCE for school candidates, 2025.”
“As part of our efforts to curb examination malpractice, the council embarked on an innovation (paper serialisation) already deployed by a national examination body. It is also worth noting that this is in line with best practices in assessment,” the statement read.
“The paper serialisation was carried out in Mathematics, English Language, Biology, and Economics. However, an internal post-result release procedure revealed some technical bugs in the results.”
“The council, being a responsive body that is sensitive to fairness and professionalism, has decided to urgently review and correct the technical glitches that led to the situation. As a result, access to the WASSCE (SC) 2025 results has been temporarily denied on the result checker portal.”
The council extended Its deep and sincere apologies to all affected candidates and the general public and appreciated their patience and understanding as they work diligently to resolve the technical Issues with transparency and urgency within the next 24 hours.
Adesina advised candidates who have previously checked their WASSCE results to re-check after 24 hours from Thursday, August 7, 2025.
She added: “WAEC remains committed to upholding excellence, fairness, and transparency in all our assessment processes. Thank you for always counting on our integrity and reposing confidence in us to render quality service to the Nigerian child.”
The results of 192,089 candidates, representing 9.75% of the total number of candidates, were withheld due to various reported cases of examination malpractice, a 2.17% decrease from the 11.92% recorded in 2024. (Daily Sun)