Busting the myth of ‘miracle examination centres’ in Nigeria: private secondary schools and malpractices in WAEC and NECO examinations

The education sector is among the five most corrupt sectors in Nigeria. Some private secondary schools in Nigeria are involved in examination malpractice whereby secondary students can register for the secondary school final examination for an inflated examination fee and be assured of success, irrespective of merit. These so-called ‘Miracle Examination Centres’, mostly associated with private secondary schools, have created asymmetric opportunities for candidates who sit for Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination.

Malpractices during exams frequently take the form of using smart devices to access questions online while bribing officials, utilising ‘proxy’ candidates, accessing questions before the exams where schools have the requisite connections, and sometimes even threatening examiners with bodily harm.

Private schools are part of a large and unorganised market in Nigeria and this leaves scope for significant distortion of rules. Some of this takes place via informal connections, and these mechanisms had remained under-researched in the Nigerian context.

Our research aimed to make a contribution by identifying the distribution of formal and informal organisational power behind the success of these ‘miracle examination centres’ and identify appropriate anti-corruption solutions in line with the SOAS-ACE framework.

The research used a combination of a systematic literature review, qualitative and quantitative research methodology including gender dynamics to answer the main question ‘What are the political economy drivers of Nigeria’s “miracle centres” and how can feasible anti-corruption strategies be designed to counter them?’
entives to use educational resources for the outcomes that were intended, and thereby improve educational outcomes.

SOAS-ACE is currently undertaking research in Bangladesh and Nigeria, including in the education, health and power sectors, as well as on successful collective action that overthrew a corrupt autocracy. Moving beyond pure research, we are also monitoring the implementation of anti-corruption strategies our research has recommended, such as a strategy to reduce pharmaceutical companies’ overpricing of medicines.

Our partners on this project were:Health Policy Research Group (HPRG), University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN); principal investigator – Professor Uzoma Okoye; and co-principal investigators – Dr Chidi Nzeadibe and Prince Agwu.