The new figure represents a significant improvement from the initial pass rate, which showed that 38.32% of the candidates met the benchmark for admission into tertiary institutions.
The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) said it has rectified errors in the results of the 2025 Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE), causing a significant jump in the number of candidates who obtained credit passes in five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics.
The examination body released the revised results on Friday, August 8, 2025, as it admitted to a serious error in the marking of serialised papers, which led to a misrepresentation of candidates’ performance in the earlier results.
Speaking at a press briefing held at the Council’s national office in Yaba, Lagos, on Friday, the Head of WAEC Nigeria, Dr. Amos Dangut, expressed deep regret over the development and apologised to affected candidates.
“With deep sorrow and regret, I, on behalf of the Registrar to Council, Management and Staff of WAEC Nigeria, apologise for the discrepancies discovered in the grading of serialised papers.
“This is very difficult for us to say, but we have to admit that it is very embarrassing,” he said.
According to Dangut, the examination body had deployed a new security innovation known as paper serialisation, a measure already in use by another national examination body.
Unfortunately, it was discovered during post-examination reviews that the English Language Objective Test (Paper 3) was scored using incorrect keys due to a wrongly assigned serialised code file.
Other serialised subjects included Mathematics, Biology, and Economics.
“We investigated and discovered that a serialised code file was wrongly used in the printing of the English Language Objective paper.
“This resulted in them being marked with incorrect answer keys. It is important to note that candidates who wrote the exams using the computer-based mode were not affected,” Dangut explained.
Maths and English pass rate jumps to 62.9%
Following the correction, 1,794,821 candidates, which represents 91.14%, obtained credit and above in a minimum of five subjects (with or without English and Mathematics).
A further breakdown showed that 1,239,884 candidates, or 62.96%, scored five credits, including English and Mathematics, a significant improvement from the previously reported 38.32%.
Of this number, 657,819 (53.05%) were female, while 582,065 (46.95%) were male candidates. However, the results still reflect a significant drop of 9.16% from the 72.12% performance recorded in 2024.
Meanwhile, WAEC confirmed that a total of 1,969,313 candidates sat for the examination, including candidates from schools in the Benin Republic, Côte d’Ivoire, and Equatorial Guinea, which operate the Nigerian curriculum.
The new figure represents a significant improvement in the pass rate from the previously announced result, which showed that 754,545 or 38.32% of the candidates met the benchmark for admission into tertiary institutions.
The examination body also said 1,763,470 candidates (89.55%) have had their results fully processed, while 205,916 (10.45%) still have one or more subjects pending due to technical issues.
It assured the public that all efforts are ongoing to conclude processing and release outstanding results shortly.
Meanwhile, WAEC has withheld the results of 191,053 candidates (9.7%) over allegations of examination malpractice. The figure is lower than the 11.92% recorded in 2024.
The Council said investigations are underway and urged affected candidates to seek redress via waecinternational.org/complaints.
“WAEC will continue to sanction all cases of examination malpractice. All hands must be on deck to sanitise the system,” Dangut stated.
