Meeting NECO’S Mandate Under The First Leadership Of Pioneer Staff, Abubakar M. Gana; Prospects, Challenges And Success
By Waziri Isa Adam
Evolution and Mandate
By the year 1977, there was a general consensus among almost all major stakeholders in the education sector in Nigeria that the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) which was established by law in 1951, but took off in 1952 as Africa’s foremost examinations body with the mandate to provide qualitative and reliable educational assessment, encouraging academic and moral excellence and promoting sustainable human resource development and international cooperation, WAEC had not been able to live to its mandate, at least in Nigeria.
To come to its rescue therefore, successive regimes and governments from 1977 – 1997 set up different commissions/Panels to look into the causes of the failure of WAEC to meet its mandate and proffer solutions, giving the yearly surge in the number of candidates seeking admissions into Nigerian institutions of higher learning, particularly universities.
In 1977, General Obasanjo set up the Sogbetan Commission of inquiry to look into the causes of WAEC widespread leakages. The committee recommended among other things, that other examination bodies should be established, if the problems were to be addressed. However, typical of Nigerian governments tradition of indifference in implementing recommendations of commissions, no action was taken.
In 1982, WAEC admitted before the House of Representatives committee on education that Nigeria needed to establish additional examination bodies with a view to ceding some of its responsibilities to enable it function more efficiently. As the problem persisted, President Shehu Shagari set up “Angulu Panel” to examine WAEC’s inability to cope with its workload. The panel recommended, among other things, that three Regional Examination Boards should be established. Unfortunately, none of the recommendations of Angulu was implemented.
Similarly, when General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida took over government after President Shagari, he took bold step to address the workload problem of WAEC by setting up the Okoro panel in 1989 which he mandated to examine WAEC’s inability to conduct confidence inspiring examinations.
The Okoro Panel recommended, among other things, that to address WAEC’s problems, government needed to establish additional national examination bodies. Regrettably, recommendations of Okoro Panel did not see the light of the day.
But, following IBB’s later appointment, in 1991, of a foremost, credible and respected educationist of his time, Professor Aliyu Babatunde Fafunwa, as Minister of Education, who when he saw the lack of political will to implement previous recommendations, decided to set up a Taskforce chaired by Professor Osiyale, to articulate all the previous recommendations with a view to setting up the machinery for implementation. The report of the Osiyale Taskforce led to the establishment of National Board for Educational Measurement (NBEM) and the National Business and Technical Examinations Board (NABTEB) in 1992, through the enabling decrees 69 and 70 establishing NBEM and NABTEB respectively, which were promulgated in 1993. The National Board for Educational Measurement (NBEM) took charge of conducting the National Common Entrance Examinations (NCEE) for admission of candidates into the Federal Unity Colleges (FUC) and the Suleja Academy. NBEM was also charged with the responsibility of conducting the Junior School Certificate Examinations (JSCE) for Federal Unity Colleges and other allied institutions that were hitherto conducted by WAEC. The National Business and Technical Examinations Board (NABTEB) took charge of conducting business, technical and trade examinations that were also hitherto conducted by WAEC and the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) of London and the City & Guilds of London Institute. Consequently, the workload of WAEC was drastically reduced.
In his efforts to address the lingering WAEC problem, General Sani Abacha set up the Etsu Nupe panel, in 1997, to re-examine the Nigerian education system. In the same year, the vision 2020 was set up by the Federal Government with a committee on review of the Nigeria’s Education system. Both the Etsu Nupe panel and the vision 2020 committee observed that in spite of the drastic reduction in its workload, WAEC’s challenges still persisted and therefore recommended the establishment of an indigenous examination body parallel to WAEC as Nigeria’s home-grown alternative examination body. The harmonized report of the two committees was published in January 1998. The published report was presented at the 46th meeting of the National Council on Education (NCE) held at Abeokuta Ogun state in March 1999, where a resolution to upgrade the National Board for Educational Measurement (NBEM) into a full-scale national examination outfit of the same standard as WAEC was passed.
NECO’s Mandate
Following the formulation of a policy to create the National Examinations Council (NECO), NBEM, consequently became and remains the nucleus of NECO. NBEM’s capacity was built by employing additional qualified personnel, acquiring more equipment and facilities and upgrading the existing ones. These, consequently, made it stronger, and its capacity was therefore upgraded and enhanced to meet international standards, before its eventual transformation into the National Examinations Council (NECO), with the initial mandate to commence the conduct of Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE), the maiden edition of which was successfully conducted in June/July 2000, with resounding success. NECO has up to date successfully continued to discharge all the mandates of NBEM in addition to the conduct of the Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) without prejudice to the existing functions and powers of WAEC.
Prospects
The National Examination body today boasts of competent, highly professional and skillful staff who have the capacity to conduct examinations for the entire African continent.
It is in recognition of this fact that some schools in various west African Countries used to reach out to NECO to organize its kinds of examinations for them; such as Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE), Senior Secondary School Examination and National Common Entrance Examination. Some of these countries include Equatorial Guinea, Benin Republic, Togo etc.
Also in recognition of its capacity and abundance of experts on the conducts of all kinds of examinations, particularly objective examinations, a number of Nigerian universities used to contact NECO to train its academic staff on the arts and science of conducting such examinations.
NECO, according to our research is the only known examination body in Africa with the kind of logistics and veterans in examination Administration that can set 1000 objective examination questions that can be answered in 30 seconds.
It was in recognition of this capacity of NECO that Nigerian Liquefied and Natural Gas approached it recently with the contract to set 1000 objective Mathematics examination questions for candidates seeking employment with it. NLNG said the examination should be set in such a way that the questions can be answered in 30 seconds and it did successfully.
One other great and undisputed area of strength of this examination is its knowledge of all nooks and crannies of the country where it staff go to conduct examinations.
There are many areas of strength of NECO that if explored by organizations such as the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) that will help in no small measure in the successful conduct of elections in the country.
Unlike INEC which also enters different nooks and crannies during its mostly 4 yearly election periods, NECO, at least, enters those places twice every year.
It is for this reason therefore that one can say without fear of contradiction that NECO is the master of knowledge of Nigeria’s cities and villages, a kind of rare knowledge that is a no small asset for a country like Nigeria.
Challenges
Even though the council was in the recent past grappled with myriad of challenges before the appointment of Mr. Abubakar Gana as the Acting Registrar/Chief Executive Officer on 10th May, 2018. Some of these challenges and controversies had no doubt impacted negatively on the public perception of the institution as a credible and reliable examination body. A popular dictum which says where there is a will, there is a way captures succinctly, the stewardship of Mr. Abubakar Gana in the last one year that he assumed the mantle of leadership in the Council.
The Man – Gana
The Council, since its establishment, had been by led by outsiders from different universities until recently and for the first time, it is under the leadership of one of its Pioneer Staff, Alhaji Abubakar Muhammad Gana.
Gana, who is not only the first insider to rise through the rank to become the Council’s Chief Executive Officer, in fact, he is the first to come from the Council’s host region and the first, in the more than, 22 – year history of the Council that seem to be working hard to leave undeletable mark and unparalleled legacies in NECO.
An indigene of Gombe State, Gana is an Alumnus of the famous and one of the leading universities in Nigeria – Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, where he obtained his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Physical and Health Education.
Achievements
The Acting Registrar has not only calmed frayed nerves, but also repositioned the Council for greater efficiency by adopting various measures. As part of the measures to reposition the Council, Mr. Gana commenced the immediate implementation of the Manpower Development Plan by a Ministerial Committee which was Chaired by Mr. Mohammed Umar, a Former Director of Human Resources in the Federal Ministry of Education.
The implementation necessitated the posting and transfer of personnel to their areas of specialization, where their contributions to the development of the Council could be optimally utilized.
Despite that the Acting Registrar took over the mantle of leadership a few days to the commencement of the 2018 June/July SSCE, Mr. Gana through sheer strong will was able to surmount the challenges and successfully conducted and released the result of the examination within 40 days after the last paper was written.
This feat was never achieved in the history of the Council since inception. This has enabled candidates who participated in the unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) conducted by the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) to assess and make use of the NECO results to process their admission into tertiary institutions before the deadline set by JAMB.
The 2019 SSCE which commenced and progressed smoothly nationwide, under the able leadership of Gana, the 2019 National Common Entrance Examination (NCEE) were successfully conducted and the results released while Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) was also conducted and results released to schools.
To ensure smooth conduct of future SSCE and to check incidence of impersonation during her examinations, the council recently acquired 20 pick-up vans and 8,000 units of Biometric Data Capturing Devices. The last time logistics vehicles were procured in the council was in 2013.
In the last one year, Mr. Gana has demonstrated that he is a team player. For the first time, Council conducted her June/July examination during which every staff participated. As a consequence, the Council has witnessed calmness and peace never seen before.
Under the able leadership of Mr. Gana, NECO has been repositioned in the hearts of her critical stakeholders. Stakeholders like External Monitors, Supervisors, Security Personnel and other ad-hoc staff, for the first time gave testimonial reports of how happy they were that their honorarium was promptly paid by the NECO Management unlike in the past when such payments were delayed.
Other achievements recorded under the able leadership of Gana included:
Remittance of about N2 billion to the coffers of the Federal Government due to prudent management of available resources; Timely and transparent conduct of staff promotion examinations
Prompt and full payment of Duty Tour Allowances (DTA) to Officers on out of station assignments
Upward review and prompt payment of honorarium to Examiners and other ad-hoc staff engaged by the Council
Development of new government-approved website for the Council
Interlocking of the link roads and parking area in the Council Headquarters
Sacking of 70 fake certificated staff of the Council, in line with the 9th etho of the Council which was developed by Prof. S. B. U Uwakwe, which emphasizes zero tolerance for impunity
Provision of office accommodation;
The prudent and patriotic leadership of Gana led to the Council’s provision of befitting office Accommodation of all States/Zonal offices in the country which include – FCT Office at Kubwa, Delta State Office at Asaba, Rivers State Office at Portharcourt, Cross River State Office at Calabar, Bayelsa State Office at Yenagoa, South East Zonal Office at Enugu, North East Zonal Office at Bauchi, Liaison Office at Lagos.
Renovation of state offices: Gana also awarded comprehensive renocation of State Offices that include Adamawa State Office at Yola, Zamfara State Office at Gusau, Osun State Office at Osogbo, Fencing of Oyo State Office at Ibadan, Fencing of NECO Warehouse at Minna to safeguard council vehicles from vandalization, Completion of Administrative Block B at the Headquarters in Minna.
Purchase of 20 units of Hilux vehicles by Gana, which the council had tried to buy five years ago before Gana’s assumption of office, but with no avail;
Purchase of 8,000 Biometric machines to boost its operation. The machines were bought as part of Gana’s efforts to help in verifying Candidates records at the examination centers thereby curbing examination malpractice;
Gana, as a seasoned and astute Administrator, is a good listener who is not given to unnecessary rhetorics as he believes in the sanctity of facts. These qualities have distinguished as well as endeared him to his admirers within and outside NECO.
The prudent and patriotic leadership of Gana led to the Council’s provision of befitting office Accommodation of all States/Zonal offices in the country which include – FCT Office at Kubwa, Delta State Office at Asaba, Rivers State Office at Portharcourt, Cross River State Office at Calabar, Bayelsa State Office at Yenagoa, South East Zonal Office at Enugu, North East Zonal Office at Bauchi, Liaison Office at Lagos.
Renovation of state offices: Gana also awarded comprehensive renovation of State Offices that include Adamawa State Office at Yola, Zamfara State Office at Gusau, Osun State Office at Osogbo, Fencing of Oyo State Office at Ibadan, Fencing of NECO Warehouse at Minna to safeguard council vehicles from vandalization, Completion of Administrative Block B at the Headquarters in Minna.
Purchase of 20 units of Hilux vehicles by Gana, which the council had tried to buy five years ago before Gana’s assumption of office, but with no avail;
Purchase of 8,000 Biometric machines to boost its operation. The machines were bought as part of Gana’s efforts to help in verifying Candidates records at the examination centers thereby curbing examination malpractice;
Gana, as a seasoned and astute Administrator, is a good listener who is not given to unnecessary rhetorics as he believes in the sanctity of facts. These qualities have distinguished as well as endeared him to his admirers within and outside NECO.
In recognition of his immense contributions to the development of the education sector, the leadership of National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) recently conferred an award of excellence on him.
Mr. Gana has no doubt raised the bar of excellence in NECO, he also has a lot more to contribute towards the development of the nation’s educational system.