According to a report by SaharaReporters, a 68-year-old retired permanent secretary and over 140 others who were caught impersonating during the Anambra State teachers recruitment Computer Based Test (CBT) examination conducted on Saturday, June 18, have been freed by the state Ministry of Education in violation of the Examination Malpractice Act.
The CBT exam was first conducted on Saturday, June 4, but was later cancelled following reported malfunctioning of the website barely 30 minutes into the examination, due to suspected cyber-attack.
The state Commissioner of Education, Prof. Ngozi Chuma-Udeh, had accused about 1000 teachers employed by the former Governor Willie Obiano under the Parents, Teachers Association (PTA) who protested their sack by Governor Chukwuma Soludo government, for being responsible for the cyber-attack.
Speaking with SaharaReporters on the phone, the education commissioner said that the 68-year-old retired Permanent Secretary in the state whom she did not mention his name presented an affidavit that he was 38 years old.
According to her, the man insisted on writing the exam until she asked the invigilating supervisors to allow him write the exam.
“The man came in but he did not know we were monitoring him. He wrote the first one and logged in for the second one and the invigilating supervisor called me and told me that the man was up to something but I told him to wait, that I would catch him,” she said.
The Commissioner said they caught the man while trying to write the second exam; and he then claimed that he was a senior citizen. But when asked why he was impersonating, he claimed his wife was late and he was living alone as his three children who would take the job.
“When I asked him if what he did was right as a senior citizen he claimed, he insisted that we must allow him to write the exam. We caught more than 146 impersonators.”
However, when asked what happened to the 68-year-old man and the rest of the impersonators caught during the exam, she said they stopped them from writing the exam but let them go.
“We let them go but we stopped them from writing. Then for the old man, we went to history, removed the first one he had written for his daughter and asked him to go.”
Meanwhile, Section 3 (2a-c) of the Examination Malpractice Act 1999 No. 33, on impersonation provided that “A person guilty of an offence under subsection (1) of this section is liable on conviction:
“In the case of a person under the age of 18 years, to a fine of N100,000 or imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years or to both such fine and imprisonment.
“In the case of a principal, teacher, an invigilator, a supervisor, an examiner, or an agent or employee of the examination body concerned with the conduct of an examination, to imprisonment for a term of 4 years without the option of a fine; and in any other case, to imprisonment for a term of three years without the option of a fine.”
