A Minna-based human rights activist, Evangelist Peter Udoh,
has attributed the planned scrapping of the National
Examinations Council (NECO) as contained in the Parry
Oronsaye committee report as part of vendetta against those
who may have refused to ‘play ball’ while the committee was
carrying out its assignment last year.
Reports of scrapping of the only indigenous examination body
that complements the West African Examination Council
(WAEC) on the pages of some national tabloids generated
more of condemnations than commendations across different
segments of the Nigerian populace.
The media reports which claimed to have been based on
Oronsaye’s report had revealed that the Federal Government,
acting on the committees’ recommendations listed NECO
among other 38 federal MDAs slated for scrapping or merging
for undisclosed reasons.
While staff of NECO were jittery over what fate could hold for
them if the examination body was scrapped, other Nigerians
were showing sympathy going by years of shortcomings on
the WAEC in successfully conducting examination and as well
timely releasing results, a gap which NECO as an alternative
examination body has successfully bridged.
Scrapping of NECO as contained in the committees’ report
would be the greatest mistake for the education sector, he said
as he called on the federal government to scrutinise the
Oronsanye report to ensure that those who fell under the
panel’s sledge hammer are not only those that refused to play
ball while the panel was undertaking its assignment.
The Rights Activist while reacting to the reports wondered why
the scrapping of NECO since it was established to bridge the
gap which WAEC could not fill in successfully conducting and
timely release of results of prospective candidates seeking for
admission into tertiary institutions in Nigeria.
“Otherwise why would any sensible person recommend that
NECO should be scrapped and its structures and statutory
responsibility to be taken over by WAEC, a regional body”,
Evangelist Udo further explained.
Meanwhile, normal official activities has returned at the
headquarters of NECO in Minna, Niger state capital even as
staffers gathered in groups to discuss what fate could have
befell them over media reports indicating federal government’s
decision to scrap the council alongside other similar bodies.
Though officials from the Public
Relations unit of NECO declined
comments when approached on the issue as they directed our
Correspondent to the Registrar/Chief Executive of the council,
Professor Promise Nwachukwu Okpala who was also not on
seat at the time of the visit, feelers from the agency indicated
that, uneasy calm among all segments of staff over the reports.
One of the senior officials who craved anonymity however told
our correspondent that there was no rationality behind the
moves to scrap NECO, “Let’s look at it this way, Britain is not
up to half the size of Nigeria and it has about eight examination
bodies. How then can Nigeria scrap its only examination body?
“Secondly, why WAEC? WAEC does not belong to Nigeria,
so what does the country stand to gain by handing over
structures of NECO to the WAEC? And thirdly, how possible
is it for WAEC or any examination body for that matter to
organize one SSCE in November and another two months later
in January when they have not released the result of the one
conducted in November”.
Again, have we forgotten so soon when Nigerian candidates
suffer untold hardship in the hands of WAEC the senior staff
said, explaining that, “During that time, open any newspaper
what you see are pleas by candidates asking WAEC to release
their results. The coming of NECO actually stopped all that”.
To me, talking about NECO scrapping is like retrogressing
backward to may be to the pre-colonial era, “Now we are
taking ourselves back to the era of colonialism. May be we
should hand over the Presidency of this country back to
Britain” .
( Daily Independent )
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