The National Examination Council (NECO) has released the 2019 National Common Entrance Examination (NCEE) into the Federal Government-run unity schools across Nigeria.

The registrar of the council, Abubakar Gana, presented the results to the Minister of Education, Adamu Adamu, on Tuesday in Abuja.

The common entrance examination took place on April 27.

According to the registrar,77,832 candidates registered for the examination but only 73,347 sat for the examination.

“We had 18 visually-impaired students who sat for the examination,” he said.
When asked for the data on the performance of candidates, the registrar said it is the ministry that will provide the statistics.

Minister speaks

The minister, Mr Adamu, said the admission exercise will commence on May 14 with the first batch of admissions coming from the first week of June.

He said supplementary admissions will take place between July 13 and 20.

Mr Adamu said all the unity schools will be opened for resumption by the second week of September.

“For next year’s admission, we shall adjust the exam schedules to ensure that children get their admission letters before the end of April. In this year’s exercise, the following shall constitute the admission criteria:-national merit – 60 per cent, equality of States – 30 per cent and other factors – 10 per cent,” he said.

He said candidates who applied for schools outside of their states of origin will be given priority.

“Six candidates scored 191 out of the 200 questions while two candidates scored 1. The director of basic education should investigate this,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Minister of State for Education, Anthony Anwukah, lamented the low number of candidates who wrote the examination in Zamfara State.

“The governor needs to be asked why only 59 candidates wrote the examination in Zamfara State,” he said.

Background

Currently, Nigeria has 104 unity schools.

News reports show that 79,878 pupils sat for the examination into federal government colleges in 2018, while 78,378 sat for the exams in 2017.

The first set of unity schools was set up by the British, before Nigeria’s independence on October 1, 1960.

Three additional ones were established in Warri, Sokoto, and Enugu in 1966 while the Yakubu Gowon military administration, in 1973, established more schools in all the 12 states that existed then.

NECO is an examination body in Nigeria that conducts the Senior Secondary Certificate Examination and the General Certificate in Education in June/July and November/December/ respectively.

NECO was created by the regime of former Head of State, Abdulsalami Abubakar, in April 1999.