The West African Examinations Council (WAEC), Nigeria, has officially released revised results for the 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for school candidates. This comes after the discovery of significant grading discrepancies that distorted candidates’ performance outcomes across several subjects.
Speaking during a press briefing at the WAEC national office in Yaba, Lagos, the Head of WAEC Nigeria, Dr. Amos Dangut, offered a public apology on behalf of the Registrar to Council, management, and staff. He admitted to a major error in the marking process of serialised examination papers, which led to inaccuracies in grading.
Dangut disclosed that the council had recently adopted a security enhancement feature known as paper serialisation, a system already in use by another national examination body. However, a critical flaw emerged when it was discovered that the English Language Objective Test (Paper 3) had been scored using incorrect answer keys. This was traced to a wrongly assigned serialised code file, which impacted the marking accuracy. Fortunately, candidates who wrote their examinations through the computer-based testing (CBT) mode were not affected.
The error also affected serialised subjects such as Mathematics, Biology, and Economics. After a thorough post-examination review and correction, a more accurate performance report was released. According to the updated statistics, 1,794,821 candidates, representing 91.14 percent, obtained credit and above in a minimum of five subjects, with or without English and Mathematics. More notably, 1,239,884 candidates (or 62.96 percent) achieved five credits including English and Mathematics. This marks a significant jump from the previously reported 38.32 percent.
Gender-disaggregated data shows that 657,819 of those candidates were female, representing 53.05 percent, while 582,065 were male, making up 46.95 percent. Despite the revision, this performance still reflects a 9.16 percent drop when compared to the 72.12 percent pass rate recorded in 2024.
A total of 1,969,313 candidates sat for the 2025 examination, including those from WAEC-participating schools in Benin Republic, Côte d’Ivoire, and Equatorial Guinea, all of which follow Nigeria’s curriculum. WAEC also accommodated 12,178 special needs candidates, including those with visual impairment, hearing impairment, physical disabilities, and mental challenges. The results of these candidates have also been processed and released.
WAEC confirmed that 1,763,470 candidates, representing 89.55 percent, now have fully processed results. However, the results of 205,916 candidates, amounting to 10.45 percent, remain pending due to technical issues that are currently being resolved.
Meanwhile, 191,053 candidates, representing 9.7 percent, have had their results withheld over allegations of examination malpractice. This figure shows a slight improvement from the 11.92 percent withheld in 2024. WAEC assured the public that investigations are ongoing and encouraged affected candidates to file complaints via waecinternational.org/complaints.
Dr. Dangut reaffirmed WAEC’s commitment to upholding the integrity of its examinations and vowed that the council will continue to impose sanctions on all proven cases of malpractice. He emphasized the need for collective efforts from stakeholders to cleanse the system of corrupt practices.
Candidates are encouraged to access their results through the WAEC result portal at www.waecdirect.org. Digital certificates will be made available within 48 hours of result verification, while hard copies will be ready for collection within 90 days.
WAEC also addressed the issue of candidates whose results are being withheld due to unpaid examination fees by some state governments. According to Dangut, affected candidates will not be able to access their results until the council receives the necessary payments. He appealed to the relevant state authorities to act promptly so that students and schools can obtain their results without further delay.
In a heartfelt conclusion, Dangut expressed profound regret over the emotional and psychological distress the incident has caused candidates, parents, school officials, ministries of education, and the general public. He assured stakeholders that robust measures are being implemented to ensure that such a grave error never happens again.
WAEC extended its appreciation to the Federal Government, the Minister of Education, and various state education bodies for their unwavering support throughout the review and correction process.
