Primetime Limited, producers of the National Science and Maths Quiz (NSMQ) has told Prempeh College that “sullying the reputation of the competition is not an action one takes when one is truly gracious in defeat; disagreeing, but accepting the outcome in good faith is graciousness in defeat.”
The producers’ statement come on the back of a protest written by the coordinators of Prempeh College’s NSMQ and Old Boys’ Association on behalf of the school, stating that a riddle which was correctly answered by their team was marked wrong despite getting the answer correct.
Prempeh College in the said protest indicated that, that second semi-final contest that saw them out of the competition was fraught with injustice.
In the said letter, the school stated the riddle which they believe their contestants answered correctly, and gave analysis with diagrams substantiating their claim.
In a response provided by the organisers and posted on NSMQ X page, formerly, Twitter, it said it places “premium to fairness in the adjudication of contests to all participating schools” adding that “Primetime has no interest whatsoever, in which school wins, or loses a contest, or, ultimately, the championship trophy. We place a very high premium on the integrity of the programme and so go to great lengths, too numerous to recount here, to protect it.”
“While we greatly appreciate Prempeh College’s keen interest and passion for the NSMQ, we draw the line at insinuations of bias and attempts to favour some schools. We place premium on fairness to all participating schools, which is why we allow protests from schools, to ensure that there is fairness in the adjudication of contests,” the statement indicated.
The statement further noted that “the ability to protest a question, answer, or mode of adjudication is not a new one and we would like Prempeh College to use the procedure described in the NSMQ Rules to address their grievances, rather than to resort to a smear campaign on social media.”
“Sullying the reputation of the competition is not an action one takes when one is truly gracious in defeat; disagreeing, but accepting the outcome in good faith is graciousness in defeat,” it added.
Primetime went on to explain that “where a school’s protest is found to have merit, the error is rectified and the appropriate marks are awarded to them. Indeed, we are known to pause contests, so as to resolve a protest that has been made by a school. In this instance, the Prempeh team’s protest was reviewed by the Physics consultant, who then explained the concepts to the team, which the team accepted. Consequently, this turnaround and insinuation that a deliberate injustice has been carried out against Prempeh College is rather surprising.
“The ability to protest a question, answer, or mode of adjudication is not a new one and we would like Prempeh College to use the procedure described in the NSMQ Rules to address their grievances, rather than to resort to a smear campaign on social media. Sullying the reputation of the competition is not an action one takes when one is truly gracious in defeat; disagreeing, but accepting the outcome in good faith is graciousness in defeat.
“It would be very unfortunate for anyone to dismiss the great effort and investment of time and money that the contestants and trainers put into preparing their teams to excel at this competition, by insinuating that Primetime is biased towards some schools and manipulates contests in their favour. A five-time champion knows, from experience, the challenges preparing for and triumphing over all other participants present to the team and how much hard work goes on behind the scenes and on stage, to produce excellent results at each edition of the NSMQ,” the statement contained.
Meanwhile, Primetime’s explanation of Prempeh College’s response being wrong can be found in the link below:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Response to Prempeh College petition concerning unfair ruling in the NSMQ 2023 Semi-final contest that featured Prempeh College, Opoku Ware School and Pope John SHS. #NSMQ2023 #NSMQ30 #Primetime pic.twitter.com/efivIj4JtJ
— National Science & Maths Quiz (@NSMQGhana) October 23, 2023
