The West African Examinations Council (WAEC), says reports about a supposed leakage of the Food and Nutrition Practical paper of the ongoing West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), are untrue.
Addressing the media on Monday, August 23, 2021, the Head of the Ghana Council of WAEC, Wendy E. Addy-Lamptey, stressed that “the information put out by EduWatch about the alleged leakage… is untrue, misleading and is creating anxiety among the candidates and our public”.
The reports about a leak for the August 20 paper were put out by the African Education Watch Executive Director, Kofi Asare, via his Facebook page.
Mr. Asare claimed at the time that he had reported the leak to WAEC.
Mrs. Addy-Lamptey explained that guidelines for the Food and Nutrition Practical are however released early to help schools prepare adequately for the practical examination.
“It is purely to enable the teachers to prepare for the conduct of the actual paper, which was taken on Friday, 20th August,” Mrs. Addy-Lamptey said.
“The paper clearly contains only guidelines and was already in the public domain, hence we are surprised that somebody picks it up and refers to it as a leaked document,” she added.
Moving forward, Mrs. Addy-Lamptey urged Ghanaians “to not create unnecessary tension, fear, and panic”.
“Local and international bodies that use our results for the admission of Ghanaians into tertiary institutions may doubt the credibility of certificates, making the Ghanaian child the ultimate loser.”
She further indicated that effective mechanisms have been put in place to ensure the administration of a credible examination.
Past tension with Africa Education Watch
WAEC considered suing Africa Education Watch earlier in 2021 over a report on its assessment of the 2020 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE).
The report alleged a number of irregularities witnessed during the period of the examination.
But WAEC said the report was fraught with factual inaccuracies and misleading.
The 2020 WASSCE had some papers leaked before sittings.
Confidential information on examiners was also leaked, prompting a report to the Cyber Crime Department of the Ghana Police Service by WAEC.
