Exams Fraud and Malpractice in South Sudan: Why Minister for General Education, Hon. Deng Deng Hoc, Should Resign

By Gai Phillip Magoor Ayak, Kampala, Uganda

Wednesday, December 18, 2019 (PW) — South Sudan Secondary school certificate examinations SSSCE begun on Monday this week amidst a lot of excitement from friends and families of the candidates. But that was an empty celebration as the examinations are mired in extreme levels of fraud and malpractice. Gross malpractice in the country’s national exams has persisted for a while now and is sadly being normalized.

Since South Sudan government begun conducting its national examinations, cheating and other forms of malpractice have continued to surge. However the levels of fraud in the last two years have just been outrageous. Entire examinations scripts get their way to the market places in Konyo- konyo and Juba, months before the papers are due. This year the scale of cheating was astonishing! Examination questions were not only available in the open market places but were also shared widely on social media plat forms, Whatsapp and Facebook.

It all happened at the gleeful watch of education and security officials. But they all remained amnesic. Malpractice does not stop at that stage, it continues right into the examination room. I have heard testimonies from various individuals who took part in the supervision on Monday. James (Not his real name) was exams supervisor also referred to as an invigilator in a secondary school in Jebel.

He told me that security officials demanded 10, 000 SSP so that they could allow the school authorities to limitlessly assist their students. Another teacher who supervised in a different school told me that they were blatantly encouraged to turn a blind eye to students who smuggled materials into the examination room.

But what do the authorities wish to gain with this unscrupulous practice?

I am compelled to believe that the tacit encouragement of malpractice in the exams is a deliberate tool to diminish the quality of education and keep the vast majority of the country’s population in perpetual ignorance. And the leaders are well aware of the importance of an ignorant population.

It is a huge political asset. A cunning South Sudanese politician is reputed to have once said “Cham Kuu Bai Ke ken piooc.’’ The current leaders heard the word and they want to keep us at that stage. The integrity of an examination system is an important indicator of a quality education. In our country, the education officials have compromised that vital constituent to the core.

Over the past few years, graduates of south Sudan’s school certificate have been scoring ridiculous grades. When results are announced every year, kids score super 100% in all subjects. They do not attain these grades because they are some little geniuses. It happens because of unlimited cheating that I have just underscored.

While many of these youngsters and their ignorant parents think that this is the ideal situation, they are mainly oblivious of the conspicuous ramifications this has on their future. In fact the problems of the systematic weathering of the country’s education are already apparent!

Students have no incentive to work hard, they have become unimaginably lazy. Students no longer exert the amount of energy required in their academic work. They have no motivation to attend classes. It is not uncommon today to find students loitering on the streets and in market places in all the major towns of the country.

They have become extremely sluggish because they see not need to engage in any stressful academic work when there is a guaranteed way to success- buying the scripts. Now this absurd form of corruption is alien to south Sudanese culture, atleast as far as I know.

South Sudanese students everywhere in the diaspora have earned a reputation as some great academics. In East Africa our students often come top of their classes. In Uganda where the media has made it a tradition to publish pictures of top performers in the exams, south Sudanese faces have graced the front covers of the main newspapers there for years.

Even during the dark days of our 21 year liberation war. Regional examinations conducted by the education committees in the SPLA liberated areas had integrity. There was no cheating and those students worked really hard. They are some of the best professionals serving the country right now. It is only in Honorable Deng Deng Hoc’s education system where we have suddenly become dummies and must cheat widely to succeed.

With that, the future shall continue to be grim.

The graduates of this system will essentially lack critical thinking skills, a pre- requisite for technological intelligence. According to learning behaviorists, critical thinking skills can only be cultivated in an individual only if the brain is stimulated or challenged enough- our learners today will see not need to strain their minds when they can just copy and paste. This system will therefore never produce capable thinkers that will uplift the nation.

Meanwhile, the human impact of what is happening in schools now is already being felt by south Sudanese. Recently, a trainee nurse and a graduate of South Sudan high certificate caused the death of a young woman after incorrectly administering a drug to the patient. (This happened at Al Sabah Hospital). This occurred because the ‘nurse’ couldn’t read and interpret the instructions from the doctor.

Sadly we shall continue to see these man made tragedies befall innocent south Sudanese because a substandard education is tantamount to a substandard future. Simple. The man who has presided over this massive erosion of the quality of our education is Deng Deng Hoc, the minister of general Education and Instruction. While he is an accomplished academic and a highly experienced technocrat, he has utterly failed as far as managing the SSNEC is concerned or his officials there have failed him.

Since his appointment to the docket of education in April 2016, the security of the national exams has consistently deteriorated. (Compare the results before 2016 and those after 2016). There has been huge forward shift in performance and those glossy grades have nothing to do with improvement in learning. (Because there has been no improvement).

If anything, it is a decline. Minister Deng should politely consider resigning. Or else the Parliament of South Sudan which of recent woke up from its long slumber should look in to the activities of the ministry of General Education. At least the parliamentary committee on education should form a task force to investigate the National Examination council and bring this national disgrace to an end.

The author, John Baptist Gai Phillip Magoor Ayak, is a concerned South Sudanese citizen with BA in education from Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda. He can be reached via his email: gai magoor <gaimagoor123@gmail.com>

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