My column today. From this week, my column will also be published on the back page of the Nigerian Tribune on Saturday. Snippet: As I’ve noted in previous columns, it would have been infinitely cheaper, less burdensome, and certainly more fitting for Buhari to have simply produced his school certificate than for him to hire more than a dozen Senior Advocates of Nigeria to defend his right not to produce it. Only a person who has something to hide would opt for the expensive, cumbersome, and circuitous route Buhari had chosen until now.

In the heat of Buhari’s school certificate controversy in 2015, the University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES), which administered the West African School Certificate exams in the early 1960s, said, “We can only confirm or verify results at the direct request of or with the permission of a candidate. This is in accordance with the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998 and section 40 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.” Why didn’t Buhari take up this challenge since 2015?

If Buhari truly took his WASC and wants to settle doubts about this once and for all, he should write to the UCLES, which is now known as Cambridge Assessment, and request it to write to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to certify that he took the West African School Certificate exam. This is particularly important because the WAEC office in Ghana said in a 2015 memo that it had no record of a "Mohamed Buhari who attended school in Provincial Secondary School, Katsina in Nigeria." Note that WASC results are searchable in every branch of WAEC.

Every Nigerian knows that WAEC in Nigeria is susceptible to compromise and manipulation. A university classmate of mine, who died in a car crash two years ago, once confided in me that he bribed WAEC officials in Lagos to issue him a certificate for an exam he did not sit for. WAEC’s well-known credibility problems and the over-zealousness its officials displayed in going to the Presidential Villa to present the president with an “attestation” of his certificate out of “respect” for him call the integrity of the attestation into question.

I have been informed by someone who should know that the statement of result issued by Buhari’s secondary school in 2015, which WAEC has now reproduced and validated, was the result of his mock exam, which was the basis for his principal’s recommendation to the Nigerian Army that reads as follows: “I recommend Mohamed Buhari for consideration as a potential officer. I consider that Mohamed Buhari will pass West African School Certificate, with credits in English, Maths and three other subjects.” This recommendation and Buhari’s handwritten application, apparently, are the only documents in Buhari’s personal file with the military.

Notice that the principal spelled Buhari’s first name as “Mohamed” rather than “Muhammadu,” Buhari’s preferred spelling of his first name. The statement of result Buhari’s school issued in 2015 was probably merely being faithful to the records in his mock exam. WAEC’s “attestation” of Buhari’s certificate is also faithful to this record—and spelling.

However, in his October 18, 1961 “Application to sit for RNA Qualifying Examination,” Buhari spelled his first name as “Muhammadu.” “I have the honour to apply for regular service in the Royal Nigeria Army. My name is Muhammadu Buhari and I am a Fulani. I am eighteen years old and I am in Form Six at the Provincial Secondary School Katsina,” he wrote. Read more at

john6006:
WAEC is 67 yrs 1951
PMB is 74 yrs
If you know, you know. He wrote West African Senior School Certificate@ age 7

robotix:
SPam Bot has ruined things... for those who can help, here is the link

https://www.farooqkperogi.com/2018/11/questions-still-remain-about-buharis.html?fbclid=IwAR0xP5xJ0y9wGUF174f8k5tm7a5PzA1ateSLJXo0RX6fzbeUjY26P5X_q1E

john6006:
WAEC is 67 yrs 1951
PMB is 74 yrs
If you know, you know. He wrote West African Senior School Certificate@ age 7

MalcoImX:
Your maths is wrong 'Prof.'

Are you saying that Buhari wrote WASC the year the body was formed and on the day of his birth?

john6006:


Our President sit for the waec examination dated back to 1951..so how come on the certificate is boldly printed 1951..
I think you go to school.. if not sorry.

ahiboilandgas:
bush man .....another examing council gave birth to weca..from wasc-wace-ssce.wasse etc ....u also need to produce your waec

Quorax:


In the heat of Buhari’s school certificate controversy in 2015, the University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES), which administered the West African School Certificate exams in the early 1960s, said, “We can only confirm or verify results at the direct request of or with the permission of a candidate. This is in accordance with the provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998 and section 40 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.” Why didn’t Buhari take up this challenge since 2015?

[img]https://4.bp..com/-LjPzRBkLA1I/W9znzNKFzbI/AAAAAAAAR3c/y9tSNYSmxHER2q-MhKW5lBfeaVu-YJ3mQCLcBGAs/s640/WAEC%2Bdenies%2BBuhari%2Bresult.jpg[/img]