The University of Cross River State, UniCross, has denied allegations of tampering with the original results of graduating students, attributing reported discrepancies to the ongoing transfer of examination data from an old system to a new one.
Management addressed the concerns at the NUJ Press Centre in Calabar, where they responded to questions from staff, students, and the public regarding students’ results and graduation.
Speaking on behalf of the university, Dr Anderson Etika, Director of Examinations and Results, explained that when Professor Francesca Bassey resumed in January last year, she directed a shift from the old results portal to a modern and upgraded system.
“When she came in, the school was midway through transitioning from the old portal to the new one,” Etika said.
“She sought to fast-track the process, but we encountered challenges, particularly in linking data from the old portal to the new system. There were also funding issues with the old portal, which had some outstanding liabilities before it was shut down.”
He added that management then undertook a painstaking effort to retrieve hard copies of results from all departments spanning the last 20 years, a total of over five million records.
“It was a massive task. To prioritize graduating students, we focused on uploading results from the 2017–2018 to 2022–2023 sessions to the new portal, completing the exercise within two months,” Etika said.
He acknowledged that moving data between entirely different systems could result in minor discrepancies.
“Given the scale and complexity of the task, some inconsistencies were bound to occur. However, management has nearly corrected all observed discrepancies,” he assured.
“Now we’ve been able to improve result administration”, he stated.
