Education Cabinet Secretary George Magoha has declared new steps to avoid leakage in national tests.
Speaking in Mombasa, Magoha said exam containers will henceforth be opened at 6.30am, rather than 6am, to decrease the time officials are in contact with the papers.
“If the school is near the containers, there is no reason to release the exams an hour before time. They can wait until it is about 20 minutes to go,” said Magoha.
He further noted that the ministry was aware of cartels in collusion with “a clique of rogue instructors and test centre managers” devised a plot to leak examination papers during the opening of exam containers.
“It is regrettable that the cartels are very active on something called Telegram (a secure social media application). We are watching them as they plan to open the exam material and leak the contents during the opening of the containers,” the CS said.
Magoha warned students and parents against falling prey to cartels by purchasing forged examination papers, saying, doing so is total waste of money.
The Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) exams will run from March 7 to March 9, with the rehearsals set for today.
Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) practical started on Monday and the main examination will run from March 14 to April 1.
According to the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec), a total of 2,056,719 candidates have been registered for the two examinations.
There will be 1,225,507 KCPE candidates in 28,316 centres, compared to 1,191,752 candidates in 28,467 centres in 2020.
Some 831,015 candidates have registered for the KCSE exam in 10,413 centres. In 2020, there were 752,981 candidates in 10,437 centres.
On Wednesday, the last paper, Social Studies and Religious Education, will be given.
Concerning security, the CS stated that arrangements are in the works to ensure that candidates in insecure locations like Baringo, Marsabit and Lamu are housed in hostels throughout the examination period.