Boko Haram: NECO raises alarm

.Releases 2013 Nov/Dec GCE results
.Records 48.7%, 53.8% passes in English, Maths
BY LAIDE AKINBOADE
ABUJA — National Examination Council, NECO, has
raised an alarm over the effect Boko Haram
insurgency would have on conduct of future
examinations in the northern part of the country.
Registrar/Chief Executive Officer of NECO, Professor
Promise Okpala, stated this,weekend, while
announcing release of the General Certificate of
Education, GCE, examination results of November /
December last year in Minna.
He said: “During the conduct of the examination,
the council was faced with challenges associated
with insecurity in some parts of the country.
“The challenges affected the overall time-line for
the conduct of the examination, marking of the
result scripts and the release of the results
scripts.”
Also announcing the release of the results,
Professor Okpala said there was a remarkable
improvement in candidates’ performances in the
core subjects, English and Mathematics, compared
with the situation in the previous years.
He said of the 51,759 candidates who sat for the
examination, 31,201 scored credits in Mathematics,
while 28,113 candidates, representing 48.7 per
cent of the candidates scored credit in English
Language.
He said Zamfara recorded highest cases of
malpractice in the examination, with 6.14 per cent,
followed by Imo with 5.28 per cent.
Okpala said the Federal Capital Territory and
Bayelsa State, recorded zero per cent in cases of
examination malpractice.
Okpala, who noted that there had been
improvement in NECO results in the last three
years, attributed it to its collaboration with
stakeholders and security agents, especially the
Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps, NCSDC.