The Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemka Nwajiuba, on Monday disclosed that the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) will commence on August 4. He made the disclosure during the daily Press Briefing by the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19.

The National Business and Technical Examination Board (NABTEB) and the National Examination Council (NECO) examinations would also be conducted immediately after WAEC concludes its examinations.

The final year examinations were postponed because of the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic ravaging Nigeria and many other countries of the world. The Minister advised state governments to reopen schools for the final year students who are willing do revision before the examinations.

He disclosed that the Ministry of Education would on Tuesday hold a conclusive consultative meeting with the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and leadership of the Nigeria Union of Teachers on modalities for the conduct of the examinations.

Nwajiuba disclosed that there were 19,159 registered centres for the WAEC examinations expected to be decontaminated within this week by the Federal Ministry of Environment.

The Minister however, noted some of them are private schools which ordinarily would not be the responsibility of the Federal Government to put them in shape before reopening, saying the institutions would take care of the facilities they need for reopening.

He also noted that revision classes were not mandatory, stressing that if any state feels that it does not need to reopen schools for revision before the examination, “the Federal Government does not have any issue with that.”