No fewer than 701 students in Kaduna State were prevented from sitting for the ongoing 2022 West African Senior School Certificate Examination, WASSCE, after paying WAEC fees to the tune of N12.61million.

The students from nine secondary schools in the state (five government and four private schools) were reportedly unable to write the national examination because the uploading of their Continuous Assessment, CASS, into the WAEC portal failed and the portal was shut by the examination body at the end of the deadline.

It was gathered that WAEC had notified some of the schools about the glitch on April 1, 2022, giving them time to resolve the issue. However, WAEC Zonal Coordinator for North West, Mr. Audu Paiku reportedly refused to reopen the portal for the affected schools to upload the CASS.

The Kaduna State Ministry of Education was said to have also written a letter to WAEC National Office through WAEC Zonal office in Kaduna, on April 12th, 2022, requesting WAEC to reopen its portal to allow the 701 students to upload their CASS, but the examination body refused.

The affected schools include Government Secondary School, Kuse (all 290 final year students), Government Secondary School Independence Way, Kaduna (all 150 final year students), Government Secondary School, Kagarko (110 students), Government Senior Secondary School, Iddah (100 students).

Others are Al-Bahmeen Academy, Kaduna (all 8 final year students), Kalhyatu AbdulRahman Bin Auf Academy, Jere (15 students), Great Panaf Schools, Kaduna (13 out of 62 students), ECWA Secondary School, Kubacha (10 students), and Government Secondary School, Mato (5 students).