Magoha: We have delivered credible results

“We made a promise to deliver exams that have not leaked, and I remember saying it very firmly that you can take that promise to the bank. You’re going to cash that promise today.”

Those were the words of Kenya National Exam Council (KNEC) Chairman Professor George Magoha during an event to release this year’s Kenya Certificate of Primary Education examinations in Nairobi.

Professor Magoha noted that delivering credible results did not come without its challenges, adding that the greatest of them all was overcoming the culture.

“No matter how well a strategy is a culture can destroy it,” he noted.

He explained that his council’s work was to fight the culture, adding that it entailed reorganizing the examination process at strategic, tactical and process level.

“This process of reorganization meant that we limit the people who had access to what we were doing. From where I’m standing I don’t trust anybody,” he said.

He commended his officers who he said worked 14 to 16-hour days to ensure the examination process was credible.

All their effort seems to have worked, as this goes down in history as the first KCPE examination without cancellation, according to Education Cabinet Secretary Dr Fred Matiang’i.

Dr Matiang’i, while releasing the results at the KNEC offices in Nairobi, said the best performing student in this year’s KCPE exam would not have made it into the top 90 in last year’s exam.

This, the CS opines, could be due to the widespread cheating and leakages witnessed during last year’s exams.

According to the CS, the education ministry has not done moderation of the results, adding that they have been delivered as they were.

“It is up to all of us to engage with the results. We will go to the counties where they will also get a chance to discuss the results,” he said.