WAEC revises SSCE results errors, English, Maths pass rate jumps to 62.9%

By Adesina Wahab

The West African Examinations Council, WAEC, has admitted errors in the results released early in the week with respect to this year’s Senior Secondary School Examination, SSCE, saying 1,239,884 candidates now have credit passes in five subjects or more, including English Language and Mathematics.

The new figure represents 62.9% of the 1,969,313 candidates who sat for the examination.

Also, the new figure is much better than the initial figure of 754,545, or 38.32% of the number of candidates said to have credit passes in five or more subjects, including English and mathematics, in previously announced results.

Briefing the press in Lagos on Friday evening, the Head of the National Office of WAEC, Dr Amos Dangut, admitted some lapses on the part of the Council, especially regarding the serialised questions in objective papers of some subjects.

“Gentlemen of the media, with deep sense of sorrow and regret, I, on behalf of the Registrar to Council, Management and Staff of the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), Nigeria, welcome you to this press briefing to announce the reviewed results of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for School Candidates, 2025 in Nigeria.

“You will recall that on Monday, August 4, 2025, the Council, in Nigeria, announced the release of results of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for School Candidates, 2025. In the course of the briefing, we told you that 1,969,313 candidates sat the examination and that 976,787 were males while 992,526 were females, representing 49.60% and 50.40%, respectively.

“From the analysis of statistics of candidates’ performance in the examination, we told you that out of the 1,969,313 candidates that sat the examination, 1,718,090 candidates, representing 87.24%, obtained credit and above in a minimum of any five (5) subjects (i.e. with or without English Language and/or Mathematics). And 754,545 candidates, representing 38.32%, obtained credits and above in a minimum of five (5) subjects, including English Language and Mathematics.

“However, during an internal post-examination review of the released results of the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) for School Candidates (SC), 2025, some discrepancies were discovered in the grading of serialised papers. We had earlier informed you that the Council embarked on an innovation (paper serialisation) already deployed by a national examination body.

“The Council, being an accountable, transparent and credible organisation, further investigated all the serialised papers (Mathematics, English Language, Biology and Economics Objective Papers) and discovered that a serialised code file was wrongly used in the printing of English Language Objective Tests (Paper 3), which resulted in them being scored with the wrong keys. Nevertheless, the schools that sat WASSCE for School Candidates, 2025, using the computer-based mode were not affected by this error.

“Consequently, the observable decline in the performance of candidates earlier announced was partly traceable to this absurd situation. The Council sincerely apologises for this imbroglio and deeply regrets the emotional and mental dismay it might have caused the affected candidates and all stakeholders. We have been able to fix the anomaly, and candidates can now access their results on the portal (www.waecdirect.org). At this juncture, may I announce the accurate results obtained by candidates.

“1,239,884 candidates, representing 62.96%, obtained credits and above in a minimum of five (5) subjects, including English Language and Mathematics.

“Of this number, 582,065, representing 46.95%, were male candidates, while 657,819, representing 53.05%, were female candidates. A comparison of the percentage of candidates in this category in WASSCE for School 2024 and 2025 reveals that in this year’s (2025) WASSCE, there is 9.16% decrease in performance (that is, those who obtained credit and above in a minimum of five (5) subjects, including English Language and Mathematics, as 72.12% of the candidates did that last year).

“Gentlemen of the Media, as the reviewed results of the WASSCE for School Candidates, 2025, are being uploaded on the results website, candidates should, after checking the result online, apply for their digital certificate, which will be released forty-eight (48) hours thereafter. Candidates who have fulfilled their financial obligations to the Council can access their results on the Council’s results website, www.waecdirect.org, within the next twelve hours. Copies of the new result listing will be sent to schools shortly.

“Once again, the management of the West African Examinations Council pleads with all stakeholders to pardon us at this moment. This is very difficult for us to say, but we have to admit that it is very embarrassing. We acknowledge the emotional ordeal that candidates, parents, teachers, school administrators, Ministries of Education, the media and other well-meaning stakeholders must have had to deal with. This is a trying time for us at WAEC; we are doing everything we can to ensure that such dismal situation does not recur.”

Dangut, while answering a question on whether every candidate should check again their results, replied in the affirmative, saying everything has now been put in order.

He was, however, silent on what steps would be taken against those responsible for the mix-up.

Recall that a lot of Nigerians have expressed displeasure over the poor results initially released.

Some candidates who did well in the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination, UTME, conducted by the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board, JAMB, surprisingly performed poorly in the English language, particularly in the initial SSCE results.

For instance, a parent whose child scored 368 in the UTME had distinctions in all his eight papers in WASSCE but failed English Language, complained bitterly to our correspondent and called for a review.

Earlier this year, JAMB was also involved in technical glitches that marred its UTME and had to ask some candidates to rewrite their papers.

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