The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has officially disowned a widely circulated list purportedly naming 151 secondary schools whose candidates' results for the May/June 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) were withheld due to malpractice.

This denial comes after WAEC announced the 2025 WASSCE results on Monday, revealing that results for 192,089 candidates (9.75%) were withheld pending investigations into alleged examination malpractice.

The viral document, dated August 4, 2025, and titled “Urgent notice to the following secondary schools regarding withheld results,” bore the purported signature of Dr. Florence Ajayi, Director of Examination Malpractice and Irregularities for WAEC Nigeria. It claimed results from the listed schools were withheld and instructed principals to report to WAEC's Lagos Zonal Office within 10 working days. It further demanded principals appear before a "WAEC Investigative Panel" by August 16, 2025, bringing supporting documents and affected candidates' exam scripts.

Schools named on the disputed list included prominent institutions such as:

  • Babington Macaulay Junior Seminary, Ikorodu

  • Atlantic Hall, Epe

  • Top Faith International School, Uyo

  • Corona Secondary School, Agbara

  • Christ the King College, Onitsha

  • St. Louis Secondary School, Ondo

  • Charles Dale Memorial International School, Port Harcourt

  • Stella Maris College, Abuja

  • Divine Mercy Secondary School, Asaba

  • Federal Government Girls’ College, Calabar

  • Holy Rosary College, Enugu

  • St. Theresa’s Catholic College, Oke-Ado, Ibadan

However, WAEC issued a strong rebuttal via its official Twitter/X handle (@waecnigeria) on Tuesday. The Council stated unequivocally that the list "did not emanate from its official handles" and urged the public to ignore it.

The official WAEC statement clarified: “Kindly ignore any message listing schools whose results were supposedly cancelled. Meanwhile, WAEC will never ask any centre to bring scripts of candidates to the office. Where would they get them from? Do not accept any message that is not on our handles and accredited media.”

Sharp Decline in Pass Rate Linked to Anti-Malpractice Measures
The Head of WAEC Nigeria National Office, Dr. Amos Dangut, announced that only 38.32% of the 1,969,313 candidates who sat the 2025 WASSCE obtained credits (C5 or better) in five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics. This represents a sharp decline of 33.8 percentage points compared to the 72.12% pass rate recorded in the 2024 WASSCE.

Dr. Dangut directly attributed this significant performance drop to the Council's newly implemented anti-malpractice measures.