The National Examinations Council (NECO) has taken another strategic leap in its regional expansion drive, accrediting schools in Burkina Faso to host the Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) and Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE).
The development, confirmed yesterday in Abuja through a statement by the Council’s Acting Director of Information and Public Relations, Azeez Sani, marks another milestone in NECO’s push to deliver credible assessment solutions across the continent.
Sani disclosed that the approval followed an extensive evaluation exercise carried out by a NECO accreditation team, which inspected selected institutions in the West African nation. The team assessed critical learning infrastructure, including classrooms, laboratories, libraries, examination halls, workshops, ICT facilities and security architecture, while also reviewing continuous assessment records and teacher adequacy.
He noted that the schools were granted full accreditation after meeting NECO’s benchmark for standard examination environments.
According to Sani, the expansion underscores the Council’s strategic ambition of becoming a dominant force in Africa’s education assessment landscape. He referenced NECO’s growing global footprint, including centres already operational in the United Kingdom, Togo, Benin Republic, Niger Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Côte d’Ivoire and Saudi Arabia.
Nigeria’s Ambassador to Burkina Faso, M. D. Galadima, applauded the initiative, describing it as a major relief for Nigerian families resident in the country. He explained that many parents previously endured long, risky and costly journeys to Saki in Oyo State to register their children for NECO examinations.
Galadima said the new accreditation would ease financial pressure on families and eliminate longstanding logistical challenges. He urged the Nigerian community in Burkina Faso to leverage the opportunity and enrol their children without delay.
Leader of the accreditation team, Dr Uche Ezenwanne, reinforced the significance of the move, stressing that Nigerian students in Burkina Faso would now be able to write SSCE and BECE without travelling back home. He maintained that the development consolidates NECO’s growing reputation as Africa’s most reliable examination body.
