Exam cheating is the seed of corruption and insecurity in Kenya

Kenya: Exam cheating has increased to disturbing levels. It is one of the seeds of the grand corruption and worrying insecurity and other ills we are suffering of individually and corporately. Educational institutions and personnel are at the heart of this vice.

The Kenya National examination Council prints its High school exams in Britain to avoid cheating that would occur if printed here in Kenya. A very expensive thing to do since Kenya is a poor country and Britain is a very rich country. It is like a family living in the slum ordering their annual Christmas meal from Hilton Hotel so that they can get a meal not contaminated.

Printing exams abroad is exporting jobs and giving away our hard earned foreign exchange. Clearly, it is a testimony of the nation’s disrespect to herself and admission that she cannot handle a small thing like High school exams with integrity. (Yet we have a bullet factory and want to handle nuclear power?). University exams are printed locally, in fact, in each and by each university at minimal cost to the nation.

Has that expensive venture ensured integrity in the KNEC exams?

The recent ‘chicken’ case has shown that the rot is from the head. People handling the exam at the highest level are corruptible. The British have jailed their own mentioned in the scandal but not Kenyans. Once the expensively printed exam lands in Kenya, it is in the hands of the Kenya police, the KNEC officials and the teachers. A chain is as good as its weakest link. It is no secret that the exam finds its way to the candidates long before it is done. It is even on WhatsApp! Parents have accessed it for their kids. School heads have gotten it for their schools. Students have raised money to acquire it. Then KNEC and the Kenya Police are called in to investigate! We might need to call the Scotland Yard!

The whole process of involving foreign printing firms, armed police, and invigilators from other schools is very expensive but its efficacy is proving doubtful. Invigilators aid in cheating. Police abet it, KNEC facilitates it, parents and the candidates are involved and head teachers and teachers lend their hand.

For a people living daily with contaminated utensils, water, food, and environment to order one meal a year from a 5 star hotel is a sick joke. It might be better to take the family to the hotel.

Our police recruitment is contaminated, our promotion and transfer of teachers is corrupted. We live all year round cheating and yet expect that for the national exams there will be minimal cheating. As evidence has shown, exam cheating starts at the preparation stage. The tendering process by KNEC and their expensive partners is evidence of contamination at source. Where it flows and ends, if it ever does, is anyone’s guess.

What shall the nation do with the increasing number of fake grades and toxic graduates?

“Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people”

We are our worst enemy. We kill our education system by cheating. We kill our security system by cheating. We kill our economy by cheating. We kill our health system by cheating. We kill just about everything by cheating.

The commandment is short and simple, “Thou shall not steal”

If we steal, we shall murder. We shall commit adultery. We shall dishonor our father and mother. We shall misuse the name of God. We shall make idols for ourselves and have other gods.

Then what shall come of us and our nation?