29 Oct 2023

Botswana General Certificate of Secondary Education (BGCSE) examinations resume today following two weeks suspension due to examination malpractice.

 This was announced by the Chairman of Botswana Examinations Council (BEC), Dr Olefile Molwane during a media briefing in Gaborone on Friday.

   Dr Molwane said the revised  examination timetable would start  with all components of non-compromised papers written in Phase one while phase two would include all compromised papers; all 19 papers from seven syllabi.

   He said that some papers that were affected by the postponement, include Additional Mathematics, Statistics and French and were acquired for replacement from Cambridge University Press and Assessment. 

   He said Cambridge had reserved the papers to be written in June, 2024.

 BEC chairperson said two components of Additional Mathematics which had 1127 candidates had been written while French had 600 candidates.

 He further said the speaking component of French had been written in September before the postponement.

 Additionally, Dr Molwane said, the reading and writing components were to be written during the suspension. He said 871 candidates were yet to sit for Statistics while Statistics Paper 12 had been written.

 He said Statistics Paper 22 was not to be replaced as it was not written and the assessed mark or forecast grades from centers would be used as per Cambridge practice. 

 He further said there was no change in the Statistics papers as they remained regular.

   To ensure that examinations were secure, Dr Molwane said they had monitoring compliance strategies in place such as spot checks in all the examination centers across the country. 

He assured parents, candidates and the nation that the examination was to run until December 7 as planned.

  Meanwhile, Dr Molwane said, the 10 accused candidates would seat for the examination as they were deemed innocent until proven guilty.

As for the  accused adults, he said  investigations were ongoing and they were to report to the police on the set dates.

    For his part BEC Chief Executive officer, Dr Moreetsi Thobega said leakage of examinations wa common  in other countries.

 He said they were benchmarked from those who had experienced examination malpractice on how to address the crisis.

ends