Former President Muhammadu Buhari deliberately refused to release his West African School Certificate (WASC) despite the political hullabaloo that greeted his high school leaving certificate in the build up to the 2015 general elections.
Sometime in 2018, according to him, “I was going through a drawer some days ago, and saw copies of my certificate. I always had it, but refused to release it, so that those venting spleen on it could please themselves,” Buhari was quoted as saying in chapter 5 of a book authored by his former media adviser, Femi Adesina.
The book: Working with Buhari – Reflections of Special Adviser, Media & Publicity (2015-2023) launched recently in Abuja, chronicles several insights into Buhari’s leadership and the challenges faced during his tenure.
Recalling when WAEC Registrar alongside his officials came to present the attestation certificate to Buhari in November 2018, Adesina quoted him as saying, “It would have been impossible for me to attend the Defence Services Staff College, India (1973) and thereafter, United States Army War College, as a Nigerian military officer if I didn’t sit for the WASC examinations in 1961,” Buhari said.
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He recounted that during his high school days, it was very difficult to commit examination fraud, even though it was not impossible.
“My colleagues and I who spent close to nine years in boarding school both in primary and secondary, including Gen. Musa Yar’adua, when we intended to join the military we had to take a military examination.
“We were examined in three subjects, English, Mathematics and General Knowledge because English is the language for general instruction throughout the country because of our colonial heritage.
“Mathematics in the military was necessary, coupled with Geography. We were trained how to be dropped off in the bush, given only a pair of compass and since we’re not astronomers, you’ve to learn to find your way, calculate, using the Pythagoras Theorem and others to work out your position,” Buhari added.
