The National Examinations Council (NECO) has released the 2025 Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) results, showing that 60.26 per cent of candidates obtained five credits and above, including English Language and Mathematics.
At a press briefing in Minna, Niger State, on Wednesday, NECO Registrar, Professor Ibrahim Wushishi, announced that out of the 1,358,339 candidates who sat for the examination, 818,492 achieved five credits with the two core subjects. He added that 1,144,496 candidates, representing 84.26 per cent, obtained five credits and above irrespective of Mathematics and English.
According to him, a total of 1,367,210 candidates registered for the examination, comprising 685,514 males and 681,696 females, while 1,358,339 candidates eventually participated. The results were released 54 days after the final written paper, which ran from June 16 to July 25, 2025.
Professor Wushishi further disclosed that 1,622 candidates had special needs. Of this number, 941 had hearing impairment, 191 had visual impairment, while others presented different forms of disability.
On malpractice, he revealed that 3,878 candidates were caught engaging in examination offences. This figure represents a 61.58 per cent reduction compared to cases recorded in 2024.
In addition, 38 schools across 13 states were implicated in mass cheating and would be invited for discussions before sanctions are imposed. Nine supervisors from Rivers, Niger, the Federal Capital Territory, Kano, and Osun States were also recommended for blacklisting due to poor supervision and related misconduct.
The Registrar confirmed that communal clashes in Lamorde Local Government Area of Adamawa State disrupted the conduct of exams in eight schools, affecting 13 subjects and 29 papers. NECO, he said, is in talks with the state government to reconduct the affected examinations.
Providing a state-by-state breakdown, Wushishi noted that Kano led the chart with 68,159 candidates (5.02 per cent) obtaining five credits and above, including English and Mathematics. Lagos followed closely with 67,007 candidates (4.93 per cent), while Oyo recorded 48,742 candidates with the same benchmark performance.
