The ministry of education and the directorate of examinations and assessment have undertaken to strengthen the existing security and control measurements of the national examinations and enforce it meticulously.
This came after 32 Ordinary Level national examination papers for both grades 11 and 12 were stolen last year. This led to the cancellation of the examination of all affected subjects, which were consequently rewritten earlier this year.
According to a report from the ministry, the trail of the investigation shows the theft of the examination originated from papers intended for the visually impaired candidates.
The main culprit of this theft is alleged to be an expert who was appointed for the brailling and de-brailling of the question papers. All six suspects who are in police custody made their first appearance in court and were refused bail.
In her update on the matter to the National Assembly on Tuesday, education minister, Anna Nghipondoka said working with human beings and executing such a mammoth task requires the appointment of staff with exceptional values and integrity.
“Softer skills based on value reinforcement of what national examinations stand for is required,” she said.
Therefore, she reiterated that the ministry will do a gap analysis on control measures and said a risk assessment matrix has so far been re-visited to identify the triggers and to close the gaps.
“So far, the directorate is meeting the set standards for running national examinations comfortable and effectively,” she said.
The Advanced Subsidiary (AS) level and the high-level subjects were not impacted and to that effect, the AS level results were already released earlier this month, while the high-level results are yet to be released.
On Tuesday, the ministry announced that the Ordinary Level results for grade 11 will be released tomorrow.
The results will be available on the ministry’s website or via SMS service as well as through print media.
“Send a message with your full candidate number, for example, 21OE090034 for full-time candidates and 21DE090034 for part-time candidates to 99099 or 55755. In response, your candidate number will be displayed on the screen of your cellphone,” said the ministry’s executive director Sanet Steenkamp in a statement.
– ashikololo@nepc.com.na