The West African Examinations Council has said that it will continue to hold on to the 2016 West African Senior School Certificate Examination results of candidates in 13 states until the backlog of WASSCE fees owed by the affected state governments is paid.
The council has also expressed dismay at what it described as the nonchalant attitude of the state governments to honour the agreement reached by both parties in the wake of the
examination, saying that it signalled a ‘symptom of bigger problems.’
The Public Relations Officer of the council, Mr. Demianus Ojijeogu, said this on Wednesday in a telephone interview with our correspondent.
The official, who declined to name the debtor states said that the total sum of money owed WAEC amounts to more than N2bn, with one state owing N500m. He added that eight of the debtor states were from the north, while three and two states were from the South-South and South-West geo- political zones of the country, respectively.
Alleging that some states owed the council since 2014, Ojijeogu noted that an agreement was reached early this year for the debtor states to pay 40 per cent of the total cost of the 2016 examination as a requirement for their pupils to sit for the examination.
“They reneged on the agreement we had during registration. We agreed that they should pay 40 per cent of the registration cost and pay the rest later. We used the payment to offset the backlog because some of them have owed us since 2014.
“We even told them to give us Advance Payment Guaranty from reputable banks, but one of the states brought a document from a branch of a commercial bank, not even from the headquarters of the bank. We were lenient last year and we released the results. But, if you leave it to some of them, they will not pay for five or 10 years. We will not do that this year. That is our leverage and we cannot go bankrupt because of them,’’ he said.
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