As 52 children aged 10 to 12 were caught cheating in the 2025 National Common Entrance Examination, Nigeria faces a chilling wake up call. When dishonesty takes root before secondary school, the integrity of the entire education system is at stake. With parental pressure, weak oversight and outdated exam methods driving a culture of shortcuts, urgent reforms are needed to salvage learning and rebuild trust from the ground up.
Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Education recently released the results of the 2025 National Common Entrance Examination (NCEE), the vital gateway into Federal Unity Colleges. Among the 61,290 pupils who sat for the exam, 52 were found to have engaged in malpractice — a disquieting fact considering their ages. Alarmingly, 50 of these cases came from Rivers State and two from Lagos. Though this represents less than 0.1 per cent, the symbolic weight is profound. At an age when pupils should focus on basic literacy and numeracy, some are already learning to exploit systemic loopholes. This disturbing trend raises a fundamental question: what does it signal when cheating begins before secondary school?
The NCEE is conducted each year by the National Examinations Council (NECO) to admit Primary Six pupils — typically aged 10 to 12 — into Junior Secondary School One at Unity Schools. These government established institutions operate under merit based quota filled systems and are spread across all 36 states, the Federal Capital Territory and even into Benin Republic and Togo. In 2025, 64,578 pupils registered for the exam, but only 61,290 participated as 3,288 were absent. The gender split was nearly even, with roughly 30,000 males and 34,000 females sitting the exam.
Experts cite a toxic mix of parental ambition, distorted values and an exam first mindset as key drivers of early malpractice. Many parents view admission into Unity Colleges as a ticket to prestige and future opportunity, even going as far as falsifying pupils’ states of origin to meet regional quotas. Meanwhile, the obsession with obtaining certificates at all costs overshadows the pursuit of genuine learning. “Pass at all costs” not mastery increasingly defines success in many homes and schools. This is not an isolated trend — national exams like NECO and JAMB have long been tainted by malpractice, making cheating an entrenched norm rather than an anomaly.
The spread of cheating at the primary school level is a symptom of a broader systemic rot, one that threatens the ethics and efficacy of Nigeria’s entire education system if left unchecked.
The wider picture is equally sobering. In 2024, 1.38 million candidates registered for NECO’s Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE), and over 8,400 were caught cheating — a 30 per cent improvement from the 12,030 cases in 2023. Likewise, more than 3,000 candidates were implicated in fraudulent conduct in the 2025 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME), involving impersonation, collusion with strangers and biometric fraud. Some operations were even traced to undergraduate students.
Despite NECO and WAEC efforts, Nigeria largely still relies on paper based exams, leaving the system vulnerable. The government has pledged full migration to computer based testing by 2027, with implementation phased in from late 2025 or mid 2026. A new Central Examination Malpractice Unit and plans for a National Examinations Malpractice Court aim to strengthen detection and enforcement. But infrastructure gaps remain — CCTV coverage is patchy, biometric ID systems are limited and National Identification Number verification remains inconsistent.
Investigations show that exam malpractice is not just student driven. Officials, teachers and even school administrators have facilitated cheating by leaking exam content, orchestrating ring operations or participating directly. At the primary level, anecdotal evidence suggests some schools and parents embed logistics fees that subsidise malpractice activities.
The early involvement of children in cheating highlights the urgent need for holistic educational reform. Technology upgrades such as computer based testing and CCTV are essential but not enough. Experts call for curriculum overhaul, comprehensive teacher training and a cultural focus on learning over credentials. Penalties must be harsh and applied decisively. Some proposals suggest barring students caught cheating from admission into any secondary institution for a full year. Crucially, ethics education must begin early in homes and primary classrooms rather than be deferred until later grades.
These 52 cases of 10 to 12 year olds cheating in the 2025 NCEE represent more than a statistic — they are a warning flag for a system at risk. Education leaders, parents and society face a choice: let malpractice define a generation or commit to comprehensive reform that restores educational integrity at every level. Enforcing laws, penalising adult enablers, investing in infrastructure and reviving ethics can still turn the tide. The future of Nigeria’s education system depends on it.
