New examinations ready for transport to Namibia

Iréne-Mari van der Walt







The executive director of the ministry of education, arts and culture, Sanet Steenkamp, said the early closure of schools is an attempt by her ministry to cut costs. This, she said, is to apply those funds to the costs related to the leakage of examination papers, such as the printing and distribution costs of the new exams.

At a recent press briefing, the deputy minister of education, arts and culture, Faustina Caley, announced that nearly 30 exams need to be rewritten in the new year. This will cause a delay in results and, in turn, will affect university applications as well as AS-level learning for next year.

Caley also confirmed that 10 individuals have been arrested in connection with the leak. The suspects include teaching staff.

The deputy minister attributed this decision as one that aims to protect the integrity of the qualification offered by the ministry. Should the ministry not have taken this route, the matriculants of this year would not have received an accreditation for their results and, therefore, it would not be recognised.

However, the opposition party the Landless People’s Movement (LPM) has described the incident as negligence on the part of the ministry.

“It is very unfortunate that the ministry has a soft copy but doesn’t have an alternative question paper in case any sort of eventuality occurs. That already tells you of the inability to plan for any eventuality. Once there is a leakage found, you already change your game plan to change the question paper,” said leader Bernadus Swartbooi.

The director for national examinations at the ministry of education, Clementine Garises, said there are indeed backup examinations set.

“There is always a backup examination. It’s a process; we cannot just walk in and print it. We need to follow the process,” she said. The transporting of examination papers has caused the current delay.

The University of Namibia indicated to My Zone that it will indeed be making provision for this unfortunate event.

“This is not the first time that something has happened,” said John Haufiku, the public relations officer of the University of Namibia.

The affected subjects are as follows:

Grade 12 ordinary level (legacy curriculum)

• English second language paper 1 core level and paper 2 extended level

• history paper 1 and 2

• agriculture paper 1 and 2

• development studies paper 1, 2 and 3

• biology paper 1, 2 and 3

Grade 11 (new curriculum)

• English second language paper 1

•Afrikaans second language paper 1

• Biology paper 1, 2 and 3

• Mathematics paper 1 and 2

• Physics paper 1, 2 and 3

• Chemistry paper 1, 2 and 3

• Entrepreneurship paper 1

• Business studies paper 1 and 2

• Agriculture paper 1

• Oshikwanyama and Oshindonga paper 1, 2 and 3