The presence of officials of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) in examination halls has “drastically’’ reduced incidences of malpractice.
The Registrar, National Examination Council (NECO), Prof. Promise Okpala, told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Saturday that the presence of NSCDC scared away many fraudulent invigilators.
“Their presence has really helped in drastically reducing the many incidences of examination malpractice, we commend them for this,’’ he said.
He said the bulk of examination malpractice came from the hall where students engaged in practices such as exchange of textbooks while the supervisor looked the other way.
He said others were dictating of answers as well as writing answers for candidates on blackboards by the?supervisors.
The Registrar said examiners find a lot of commonalities when marking the scripts and said: “That is sufficient evidence that the answers are from the same source.’’
He said the Council had also engaged the services of external monitors, drawn from tertiary institutions, to complement the role of NSCDC officers.
“These are people, who value examinations, by visiting the centres three days in a week during the 40–day examination period.
“They are required to observe the conduct of the examinations and report back to the council, their impression or any irregularities,’’ he explained.
Okpala said fraudsters were coming out with different methods and NECO on its part, was working assiduously to counter their activities. (NAN)