By Mumini Abdulkareem
The West African Examination Council (WAEC) yesterday opened up on the alleged certificate scandal involving the Kwara State Governor-elect, Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq.
This is the first time the examination body will be making official comment regarding the issue.
There have been reports that the Governor-elect has been making frantic efforts to cover his track with the commission to forestall any embarrassment as Abdulrazaq had been dragged to court by an activist, Adekunle Oluwafemi Abraham, over the authenticity of his result.
However, the state chapter of the APC through its Publicity Secretary, Tajudeen Aro dismissed the report as a non issue, adding that all the allegations emanating from the alleged certificate scandal of the Governor-elect are false and the party is not in any way bothered.
“He has been contesting for quite some time now and nobody has raise such allegation. I think this is just an …..imagination,. As far as the party is concerned, the issue to us is not an issue because there is nothing to handle in a case that has no basis”, he added.
But according to the Head Public Affairs Department of WAEC, Mr Demianus Ojijeogu who spoke in a telephone chat with this reporter, last night from Lagos, disclosure about the authenticity or otherwise of the certificate of Abdulrazaq can only be based on legal grounds.
“WAEC has a way of verifying result of person(s) who sat for any of the exams. It is not for us to confirm the result to you as a journalist. We can only do that to him because it is his personal record or the court (based on exigency).
“For now, we can’t be talking on whether he (Abdulrazaq) sat for the exam or not until there is a legal ground for that (compelling INEC to do so), he added.
Abdulrazaq, according to the court, has up till 30 days to defend the authenticity of the certificate following the case instituted on March 7, 2019, which is expected to lapse on April 7th, 2019.
The case with suit number KWS/73/2019 was assigned to a Kwara State High court presided by Justice Adenike Akinpelu
There were reports by online news medium, Daily Nigerian last week quoting a source at WAEC that the copy of the certificate allegedly submitted to the electoral body did not meet the required standard.
“A critical perusal at the result indicated that for WAEC result to appear as genuine, the names on the certificate must appear without abbreviation and in this case the names were abbreviated and even super-imposed on the certificate just as the candidate’s number, including the certificate number were non-existent in WAEC records.
“As you can see, this wasn’t the WAEC result given to you when you graduated from the secondary school?
“We do not abbreviate names when issuing our certificates, but as you can see the alleged certificate in circulation is abbreviated and that absolves us from any link with such certificates.
“Moreover, the certificate number and the candidate’s number embossed on the certificate for the year 1976 do not exist in our books,” the paper quoted a source at the commission who did not want his name in print.
However, schoolmates who claimed to have graduated from the Secondary school in Kaduna with him have condemned the claim that the politician dropped out.
The Government College Kaduna Old Boys Association, GCKOBA, in a statement signed by members of the Old Boys namely, Kabiru Yaro, Abdulmalik Giwa and Sanusi Ramallam, said that the claim was a “smear campaign” just a day before the election.
The statement noted that Abdulrazaq had the school registration number 1841 and was a member of the popular El-Kanemi House.
“We, the Class of 1976 at the Government College Kaduna wish to strongly condemn attempts to tarnish the image of one of us, Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, in the name of politics,” according to the statement.
Recently, the schoolmates also sponsored advertorials in some national dailies debunking the claim that the certificate was forged.
