The Registrar of the National Examinations Council (NECO), Prof Dantani Wushishi, has promised to establish examination centres for the police in Lagos State.

He made the promise during a courtesy visit to the Commissioner of Police, Lagos State Command, Mr Olohundare Jimoh, at the command Headquarters in Ikeja on Friday.

Wushishi said that NECO would consider establishing six centres for police families to access the examination.

“NECO conducts five different examinations: National Gifted Examination, which is the examination for placement into Federal Government Academy, Suleja; National Common Entrance Examination; the Basis Education Certificate Examination;

“Other are the Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (internal) and the Senior Secondary School Certificate (external) for private candidates. This examination requires students who have not been able to make the credits required for admission into tertiary institutions to sit for it to make up the required credits.

“We conduct this type of examination in the sense that any candidate can apply; we have centres specially designated that candidates can choose as close to the residence of the candidates.

“All police families can fit into the category of examinations, ” he said.

Wushishi said that the board would send its men to the locations the Lagos State Command wanted its centres to be established.

“We will send our men to look out some of the facilities that require such centers to be available for approval.

“By the grace of God, we are going to do that. It is very important because the Nigeria Police serve the nation, and their children must have easy access to examinations to remediate their failed subjects so that they can further their education.

“The request is very important to the police, their children, and the nation.

“It is duty bound on the nation to make access to education very easy, and this is one of the ways we can provide access to police children that have passed Senior Secondary School and are waiting to mediate their results.

“As fast as we receive the request from the police, we will send our men to access the area centres that the command wants us to approve for examination centres,” he said.

According to him, NECO’s challenge is funding physical infrastructure, such as offices, to facilitate conductive office work.

He thanked the Police for conducting security surveillance and physical security during its examinations.

“We have an examination intelligence committee; this is our covered committee; it has to do with examination infringement investigation; the committee is collaborating with the police to apprehend those partaking in examination malpractice successfully, ” he said.

According to him, Lagos is one of the largest states that provides the largest number of candidates.

“Lagos internally provides the second-largest number of candidates for the Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (SSCE) after Kano State.

“Last year, Lagos provided over 98,000 candidates for the SSCE, second to Kano, which provided over 104,000 candidates.

“Our collaboration with Nigeria Police has been long for a very long time. The police have been assisting NECO in conducting the examination peacefully, as well as mounting surveillance and mounting security.

“We have a lot of places we conduct examination in Lagos, and the police have been cooperating with us,” he said

He congratulated the new CP for his new appointment and wished him the best of luck.

CP Jimoh said that the collaboration between police and NECO would continue.

“Lagos Police and NECO have been collaborating and will continue this partnership. This collaboration has been going on for years; examination security has been one of the responsibilities of the police.

“We have been working with the Intelligence Department in NECO to ensure that planning for securing examination conduct in the pre-examination period, examination period, and post-examination period has been going smoothly.

“We will double our commitment to NECO and take it to a higher level; we are ready to give NECO all the cooperation it deserves, ” he said.

According to him, the six locations picked for establishing NECO centres are the areas of need: three on the Island and three on the Mainland. These locations are close to populated areas where there are many police families.

“We know this will be granted, and it will be far-reaching in enhancing the police children, wards, and families will have access to the centres close to where they are living,” he said.