1.3 million candidates participate in NECO’s SSCE

Approximately 1,367,210 students are currently participating in the 2025 Senior School Certificate Examination, organised by the National Examinations Council (NECO) nationwide, using a combination of Computer-Based Testing (CBT) and Paper Pencil Testing (PPT).

Out of the 1,367,210 candidates, 685,551 are male, while over 681,300 are female.

Kano State has one of the highest numbers of registered candidates, with more than 137,000 enrolments, whereas Kebbi State recorded the lowest, with just over 5,000 candidates.

NECO’s Registrar, Professor Ibrahim Wushishi, made this known on Tuesday while monitoring the ongoing examination at a pilot CBT centre located at SASCON International School, Maitama, Abuja, alongside the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa.

This examination marks NECO’s first attempt at conducting the O-Level examination via CBT at select centres across Nigeria.

Recently, Alausa directed NECO and the West African Examination Council (WAEC) to begin conducting their examinations using CBT by the year 2026.

As part of its pilot phase, NECO utilised several existing schools within the Federal Capital Territory for CBT deployment.

When asked how realistic it would be to implement CBT at the post-basic education level, Wushishi responded, “NECO is ready as a professional body to conduct examinations using any medium.”

He continued, “We may have challenges of infrastructure; that is obvious, but then that will not bog us down not to do it.

“There are facilities that will allow us to conduct CBT, and we are good to go for that. We are all aware that there are certain difficult terrains across the countries where we will not be able to meet up, except that there are exceptional infrastructures to allow us to do that.

“But by and large, we are very, very much ready to do that as a professional body. Provisional infrastructures. We are calling for the government at the state level to speed up making provisions for CBT infrastructures in their states.

“We highly support the process. Because we believe the process will reduce a lot of issues that have to do with examination malpractice and improve the quality of the examination and, consequently, the results and certificates.

“We are very happy that the results and certificates are recognised globally, and we need to do more to reach out across the world on our certificates and results. So NECO is fully ready as far as that is concerned.

“For this year, a total of 1,367,210 candidates registered for the SSCE, the highest figure so far. Of these, 685,551 are male and over 681,300 are female. Kano State had the highest number of registered candidates, with more than 137,000, while Kebbi had the least, just above 5,000.

“The lowest number of candidates was at the Nigerian International School in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, which registered eight students.”

Alausa stated that, to ensure the process runs smoothly, candidates may need to take their exams outside their own school premises.

He said, “WAEC and NECO exams are school-based exams being conducted at their schools. No, we will move away from that.

“It is going to be like (the way) JAMB exams are being conducted at CBT centres. We have thousands of CBT centres across the nation.

“Those are the centres that we are going to use. It’s not the case that students do not have the facilities. Schools do have the facilities.

“We have enough people. We also have to expand the value chain of these CBT centres. They should not just serve JAMB alone.

“They should be able to service WAEC and NECO. The proprietors of these businesses, the owners of these businesses, have invested billions of Naira to set up these CBT centres. So we also have to help develop a new value chain in our economy.

“They will create jobs. You see a lot of computers, hardware, and software. And more importantly, we have entrepreneurs in Nigeria who are creating and developing these solutions. These are homegrown solutions. We should all be proud. Today, we should all stand tall and be proud of what we utilise.

“These are the kinds of opportunities that President Bola Tinubu is unleashing in every sector of this economy.”

Alausa further praised NECO’s readiness to transition completely to CBT, stressing that the pilot demonstrated both capability and dedication to reform.

“This is the first in the history of NECO, which is conducting its annual O-Level Certificate exams for SS3 students. This is a pilot that we pushed to have, and I must tell you, I was very impressed with what I saw. I have to commend the Registrar of NECO for the hard work that he and his team have deployed to get us to this stage, because when we decided that we were going to go CBT, everybody thought this was an insurmountable task, but today, we’ve seen that this is a process, this is a transition that is possible.

“We just have to work hard to get there. We cannot continue with this madness of exam practice, our exams being caught with cheating, leaked questions, and both WAEC and NECO. If we allow this to continue, it will destroy the capacity of our youth, of our children.”

He also announced that CBT would be gradually introduced to all school exams, beginning with multiple-choice questions this year.

“I’m a very happy person today that NECO has transitioned to CBT from paper-based. By November of this year, both NECO and WAEC objective exams will be full CBT.

“By next year, 2026, all the essays and objective exams will be CBT. NECO and WAEC will be joining the league of JAMB. We are making significant progress,” he added.