Uganda National Examinations Board-UNEB has confirmed that 30 persons were captured for engaging in examination malpractice during the just concluded exams.
Jennifer Kalule-Musumba, the UNEB spokesperson, says police were able to arrest the 30 people and charge them in the courts of law.
The suspects participated in examination malpractices in Primary Leaving Examination-PLE, Uganda Certificate of Education-UCE, and the Uganda Advanced Certificate of Education-UACE examinations.
She says among the offenses committed by the suspects include impersonation,copying, collusion and provision of external assistance.
She says that there are also isolated cases where individuals were found vending fake papers to several schools.
Kalule further notes that the board will also set up a committee to assess the level of involvement of several candidates in examination malpractice.
Although the candidates might not be arraigned before court, Musumba says there is a way they can as well be punished.
Malpractice remains one of the challenges to the education system in Uganda and has been attributed to several factors including commercialization of education, which results in stiff competition between schools among others.
Over the years, the examination body has been tightening the grip to curb the vice. Among the recent strategies was the introduction of ‘random numbers’ to eliminate malpractice orchestrated during examination marking.
According to UNEB, all suspects who committed offences after April 1, 2021, will be tried under the new UNEB Act 2021. The act provided sanctions ranging from five year’s imprisonment or a fine of Shillings million or both.
Meanwhile, the process of marking the examination has also commenced at 40 selected schools to ensure that the board releases the results at the appropriate time and enables learners to proceed to their next level of their education.
20,000 examiners are expected to take part in the exercise to ensure that the marking process goes on smoothly and timely as planned.
A total of 1,181,940 candidates registered for their final examinations this year.
They include 749,807 for Primary Leaving Examinations (PLE), 333,766 for the Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE) and 98,367 for the Uganda Advanced Certificate of Education-UACE.
