President Mahama Orders Probe Into ‘Mind-Boggling’ WASSCE Failures

President John Dramani Mahama has expressed deep concern over the declining performance of candidates in the recent West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), describing the situation as “mind-boggling” and calling for immediate reforms in Ghana’s basic education system.

He made the remarks in Accra on Thursday 4th December, 2025, during the official launch of the STEM Box Initiative, a project aimed at equipping basic schools with hands-on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics learning tools.

Speaking at the ceremony, President Mahama said the latest WASSCE results recently released by the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) should serve as a national wake-up call.

“It has become an issue of great concern to government, parents, and the public at large,” he said. “I was speaking with the Minister, and I’ve asked them to analyze the examiners’ report to decipher what could have gone so disastrously wrong. It is mind-boggling that with the same teachers and the same factors in play, just one batch performs so disastrously.”

Mahama stressed that the root cause of the recurring poor performance lies in years of neglect of foundational education, especially at the lower primary level.

“One of the major things that has taken place in the last several years is the neglect of basic education,” he said. “The inability to send the capitation grants and ensure we have quality teachers at the foundational level has weakened the entire system.”

He warned that without strong literacy and numeracy skills at the primary level, students are simply pushed through the system “like products on a conveyor belt.”

“Once you don’t get that level right, you will just send the child through a conveyor belt like a factory,” Mahama stated. “At the end, they will be picked out by quality control and told they did not do well.”

According to him, reading, writing, and arithmetic must form the heart of basic education reforms.

“By the time a child leaves primary school, they should be able to read properly. By the time they leave primary school, they should be able to write properly. And they should be able to do basic arithmetic,” he emphasized. “If we get these three things right, we set our children up for success in secondary and tertiary education.”

Mahama also spoke strongly in support of maintaining strict exam supervision.

“Vigilance is not going to go away. Strict invigilation is not going to go away,” he said. “We must make sure that the children are well prepared to, on their own, study and pass the exams waiting for them.”

He revealed that he has instructed the Minister of Education and the Director-General of the Ghana Education Service (GES) to study the WAEC examiner’s report and propose rapid reforms to improve learning outcomes.

“I’ve asked the Minister, and he has told the Director-General of GES to study the examiner’s report and let’s see what quick reforms we can carry out to ensure our children get a quality education,” Mahama added.

The STEM Box Initiative, launched at the event, aims to strengthen science and technology education from the foundational level—a move the former President said aligns with Ghana’s long-term development goals.