Claims that private schools were disadvantaged in the marking of the 2026 Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) are not true, the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), has dismissed.
The Council insists examiners do not know the origin of the scripts they assess to influence their biases, saying candidates do not provide their school names on an exam paper.
Head of Public Affairs for WAEC, John Kapi, responding to allegations by the Ghana National Association of Private Schools (GNAPS) which has called for an audit of this year’s BECE as a result of some discrepancies, indicated that fairness is the hallmark of the examination.
He tells Joy FM in a Tuesday, August 4, 2026 interview that WAEC has designed its examination to ensure candidates’ identities and school affiliations are concealed from examiners.
He says scripts are identified only by centre numbers and candidate ranges, making it impossible for examiners to distinguish whether a script belongs to a candidate from a private or public school. “We examine all of them the same way,” he said.
“If you were to bring scripts and tell me that these are from school A or school B, I’ll not be able to identify unless I go back to the database and check which school centre number this is or that.”
Mr. Kapi stressed that every candidate is assessed using the same marking schemes and standards irrespective the schools they attended.
His comments follow claims by the Ghana National Association of Private Schools that it had received reports from member schools across the country alleging inconsistencies in this year’s results, including grades that do not reflect candidates’ academic performance and subjects that candidates allegedly did not register for.
The Association has called on WAEC to investigate the concerns and reconcile any affected results.
Responding to the concerns, Mr Kapi maintained that the integrity of the marking process remains intact because examiners work solely with coded scripts rather than school identities.
He reiterated that the Council applies the same assessment standards to every candidate.
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