The West African Examination Council (WAEC) has said inflation is behind the reason it had to increase the registration fees paid for its examinations.
The examination body said the marginal increase of the registration fee for its examination from N13,950 to N18,000 was caused by spiral inflation being witnessed in Nigeria.
The head of WAEC’s Nigeria National Office, Mr. Patrick Areghan, during a visit to one of the council’s marking centres in Abuja, said there had been a marginal increase in WAEC fees because of the country’s spiral inflation.
He said: “There has to be that marginal increase to enable us to do better services. The examiners are now happy as we are able to increase their marking fees through this marginal increase.
“The money actually went for the payment of examiners to enable us to satisfy them so that they can do the job better.”
The WAEC spokesman said each candidate registering for the examinations now has to pay N18,000, as against the former N13,950.
Asked on if the council was planning to introduce the Computer Based Test (CBT) in the conduct of its examinations, Areghan said this would only be achieved if the government could provide the required facilities to enable it conduct such examinations.
He said WAEC conducts examinations for over 20,000 secondary schools in the country and in 76 subjects.
He added , it will be difficult to use CBT for such examinations, knowing that a candidate will offer about eight subjects.
