03 Jul 2016

It is international practice to stop or cancel an examination before it is written and carry out an investigation if there is suspicion that an examination rule was violated.

Addressing Lobatse Town Council full session, Botswana Examination Council (BEC) executive secretary Professor Brian Mokopakgosi said the cancelation of an examination was crucial when violations had either been done by the examiner or the one examined.

Professor Mokopakgosi said when rules of an examination had been violated; stoppage of the examination circle was the only remedy as opposed to letting the examination circle being completed and the last resolution being to withdraw certificates from the ones examined.

He said examinations were supposed to be carried out in a very transparent manner and logically without any suspicion of leaking.

Once suspicions of leakage had been identified, he said the only plausible solution was to stop the examination and start the cycle again to prepare for yet another exam.

He therefore encouraged all involved in the examination cycle to ensure that examination leakages did not occur at all costs possible.

Professor Mokopakgosi indicated that governments ran examinations at high costs, explaining that an examination leakage which resulted in its stoppage and starting off the cycle again could cost government close to P11 million.

He said locally, so far the challenges that had been faced by his organisation had been examination leakages that occurred due to break inns at schools.

He said security in most schools across the country was compromised and therefore posed a lot of threats on examination leakages.

Commenting, councillors expressed concern on  what they termed mismatch of some grades that had led to some candidates being wrongfully graded.

Deputy mayor, Mr Francis Mokwena called on BEC to iron out their differences with examiners, as in the past it had shown that there were differences that led to those being examined not performing well in their examinations due to these differences.  

Nominated Councillor Mr Phetogo Kgothwane expressed worry on those students who did not perform well at lower levels of education and still were given green light to proceed.

Cllr Kgothwane requested for the review and implementation of the repeat policy which he said was the only remedy for students to be given a better education.  ENDS