A total of 58,187 candidates sat the 2026 National Common Entrance Examination, NCEE, conducted by the National Examinations Council, NECO, nationwide with girls accounting for the majority of registered candidates.
Speaking to journalists after monitoring the exercise on Saturday at Model Secondary School Maitama, Government Science Technical College, Garki and Federal Government Boys College, Apo, all in Abuja, the Minister of State for Education, Prof. Suwaiba Ahmad, praised the smooth conduct of the examination.
“We’ve been to three schools and I’m happy with the conduct of the exams in all the three schools. The students are orderly, they are well seated, the exam is ongoing, they started on time,” she said.
According to her, checks on registration records showed compliance with the stipulated age requirements for candidates.
“I have looked at the registration documents of the students and I can see that they actually abide by the guidelines in terms of the ages for the examination between 10 to 12 years, so I’m happy with that,” Ahmad stated.
She also commended the arrangement of examination venues and the deployment of invigilators, noting that the centres were adequately staffed to ensure a credible exercise.
“The venues are well orderly arranged with proper invigilators, the number of invigilators are adequate, so I’m happy generally with the conduct of the examination. It’s a well-organised exam,” she added.
While expressing satisfaction with the overall conduct of the examination, the minister noted the concern over absenteeism among some registered candidates.
“We have observed that there are a number of students that are absent in the exams. In one of the halls we have about 18 students that are absent, so we will look at the factors resulting in that number because it’s quite a high number,” she said.
On government efforts to improve learning facilities in schools, Ahmad reiterated the administration’s commitment to providing infrastructure that supports effective teaching and learning.
“The government is always working to ensure that we have proper infrastructure available for effective teaching and learning,” she said.
Also speaking, the Registrar of the National Examinations Council, NECO, Prof. Ibrahim Dantani Wushishi, disclosed that 58,187 candidates registered for the examination nationwide.
“So far we have 58,187 candidates registered, lower than what we had last year, which was 64,578,” he said.
A data sheet made available to journalists by NECO, showed that Lagos topped the list of registered candidates for the exercise with 13,228, while FCT followed with 9,639 and Anambra came third with 4,410 candidates.
At the bottom rung was Sokoto with the least candidates featuring only 15, followed by the Togo centre with 23 candidates and Yobe State with 41 candidates.
Wushishi noted that female candidates constituted the majority of registrations, with over 31,000 girls compared to about 26,000 boys.
“For this year too we have a higher number of female candidates, about 31,000 plus, while male candidates are just about 26,000 plus. I think this is an indication of the efforts of the ministry as far as promoting girl-child education is concerned,” he stated.
He added that the trend reflected the success of government initiatives aimed at expanding educational opportunities for girls across the country.
“It shows that we are achieving results in that direction,” the NECO registrar said.
Wushishi further expressed optimism that the hitch-free conduct observed at the monitored centres would be replicated across all examination centres nationwide.
