The Federal Government has announced plans to completely transition the conduct of school-based Senior School Certificate Examinations (SSCE) to Computer-Based Test (CBT) centres — both private and public — starting next year.
This development was made public by the Minister of Education, Dr. Tunji Alausa, while supervising a pilot CBT SSCE organized by the National Examinations Council (NECO) at Sascon International School, Maitama, Abuja, on Tuesday.
Dr. Alausa praised NECO for the smooth execution of the pilot CBT exam, noting that future SSCEs would no longer be conducted in schools but at designated CBT centres.
He stated, “WAEC and NECO exams are school-based exams being conducted at their schools. No, we will move away from that.
“It is going to be like (the way) JAMB exams are being conducted at CBT centres. We have thousands of CBT centres across the nation.
“Those are the centres that we are going to use. It’s not the case that students do not have the facilities. Schools do not have the facilities.
“We have enough people. We also have to expand the value chain of these CBT centres. They should not just be to service JAMB alone.
“They should be able to service WAEC and NECO. The proprietors of these businesses, the owners of these businesses, have invested billions of Naira to set up these CBT centres. So we also have to help develop a new value chain in our economy.
“They will create jobs. You see a lot of computers, hardware, and software. And more importantly, we have entrepreneurs in Nigeria who are creating and developing these solutions. These are homegrown solutions. We should all be proud. Today, we should all stand tall and be proud of what we utilise.
“These are the kinds of opportunities that President Bola Tinubu is unleashing in every sector of his economy.”
The minister went on to applaud NECO for its readiness to adopt the CBT model permanently, describing the pilot exercise as a strong indicator of capability and reform-oriented leadership.
“This is the first in the history of NECO, which is conducting its annual O-Level Certificate exams for SS3 students.
“This is a pilot that we pushed to have, and I must tell you, I was very impressed with what I saw.
“I have to commend the Registrar of NECO for the hard work that he and his team have deployed to get us to this stage, because when we decided that we’re going to go CBT, everybody thought this was an insurmountable task, but today, we’ve seen that this is a process, this is a transition that is possible.
“We just have to work hard to get there. We cannot continue with this madness of exam practice, our exams being caught with cheating, leaked questions, both WAEC and NECO. If we allow this to continue, it will destroy the capacity of our youth, of our children.”
He also revealed that the transition would begin with multiple-choice questions by November, before eventually encompassing essay sections.
“I’m a very happy person today that NECO has transited to CBT from paper-based. By November of this year, both NECO and WAEC objective exams will be full CBT.
“And by next year, 2026, all the essays and objective exams will be CBT. NECO and WAEC will be joining the league of JAMB. We are making significant progress,” he added.
During a post-monitoring briefing with journalists at Government Secondary School, Maitama, NECO Registrar, Prof. Ibrahim Dantani Wushishi, confirmed the council’s technical preparedness to run CBT exams effectively.
“NECO is ready as a professional body to conduct examinations using any medium.
“We may have challenges of infrastructure, that is obvious, but then that will not bog us down from do it.
“There are facilities that will give us the opportunity to conduct CBT, and we are good to go for that.
“We are all aware that there are certain difficult terrains across the countries where we will not be able to meet up with that, except that there are exceptional infrastructures to give us the opportunity to do that.
“But by and large, we are very, very much ready to do that as a professional body. Provisional infrastructures, we are calling for government at the state level to speed up making provision for CBT infrastructures in their states, because that will highly support the process.
“Because we believe the process will reduce a lot of issues that have to do with examination malpractice and improve the quality of the examination, and consequently, the results and certificates.
“And we are very happy that the results and certificates are recognised globally, and we need to also do more in order to reach out across the world on our certificates and results. So NECO is fully ready as far as that is concerned.”
Prof. Wushishi also disclosed that 1,367,210 candidates were registered for this year’s NECO SSCE, the largest enrollment figure to date. Among them, 685,551 were male and over 681,300 female. He added that Kano State recorded the highest number of candidates, with over 137,000, while Kebbi had the lowest at just over 5,000. The Nigerian International School in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, registered the smallest number with only eight students.
Meanwhile, Senator Ekong Samson, Vice Chairman of the Senate Committee on Education (Basic and Secondary), pledged the legislature’s support for a smooth CBT transition after his visit to the model school in Maitama.
“We are living in an age of technology. Nigeria must come to terms with what happens anywhere and whatever measures we need to keep our educational system abreast with the world over, we will do that as legislators,” he said.
He assured that the Senate would continue overseeing the process to maintain educational standards nationwide.
Also speaking, Hon. Oboku Oforji (PDP, Bayelsa), Chairman of the House Committee on Basic Examination Bodies, led an oversight visit to the NECO SSCE at Federal Government Boys College, Apo, Abuja.
He praised NECO’s efforts, saying, “NECO is very important to us. This is our own, WAEC is also our own…
“We are very proud of what NECO is doing under the leadership of Prof. Ibrahim Wushishi, and we pray that they sustain the tempo.
“We have gone round the school and we have seen the students’ commitment,” he added.
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