The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) has reviewed the 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) results, increasing the pass rate from 38.32 per cent to 62.9 per cent after correcting a major marking error.
Head of WAEC’s Nigeria National Office, Dr. Amos Josiah Dangut, announced the changes on Friday during a press briefing at the council’s headquarters in Yaba, Lagos.
The review affects 1,969,313 candidates who sat for the examination. Initially, WAEC reported that only 754,545 candidates (38.32 per cent) obtained credits in at least five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics — the benchmark for admission into tertiary institutions.
Following consultations and an internal audit, the council discovered that a wrongly assigned serialized code file from service providers led to errors in the marking of the English Language Objective Test (Paper 3).
“The council regrets the previous error, which was caused by the mistakes from the team of service providers that marked the Objective part of the English Language examination,” Dr. Dangut said.
With the correction, 1,239,884 candidates (62.9 per cent) now have credits and above in five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics. This includes 657,819 females (53.05 per cent) and 582,065 males (46.95 per cent).
The new figure is still 9.16 per cent lower than the 72.12 per cent pass rate recorded in 2024.
WAEC urged candidates to recheck their updated results on www.waecdirect.org within 48 hours, with digital certificates to follow shortly after.
Despite the improvement, 191,053 results (9.7 per cent) remain withheld over malpractice allegations, compared with 11.92 per cent in 2024.
The council said its swift action, supported by a new digital scoring system, was aimed at restoring public confidence in its processes.
