UNEB exonerates Luweero PLE candidates, clears results

By Frederick Kiwanuka

LUWEERO - The Uganda National Examination Board (UNEB) has exonerated 264 2024 PLE candidates from Luweero district whose results had been withheld over suspicion of alleged exam malpractices.

This is after the affected candidates from four schools in Luweero appeared before the UNEB exam security committee which summoned them in Kampala on Monday.

While at UNEB, the pupils were made to orally answer random questions that were randomly selected by UNEB officials in a bid to test the children's capacities. 

After the encounter, the security committee chairman, Ismael Mulindwa, issued a statement clearing the candidates and authorising the release of their results.

UNEB, which released the 2024 PLE results over six weeks ago, has been withholding results for 264 candidates from Luweero after the examination body suspected their schools to have got involved in exam malpractices. 

The affected pupils who have been impatiently waiting to know their fate, included 100 from Rapha Primary School, 54 from Nalongo Islamic Primary School, 52 from Bombo Parents Primary School, and 48 from Zuhura Education Center, Nkondo.

The administrators of the affected schools had come under mounting pressure from the parents who have been demanding to know the fate of their children's PLE results. 

According to a January 23 communication from UNEB, most of the affected candidates numbering 100 sat their exams at Rapha Primary School.

In a letter that was addressed to the Luwero district chief administrative officer, the UNEB executive secretary Dan Odongo stated that the exam results of the affected candidates were being withheld because their schools were involved in "exam malpractices"

"The purpose of this letter is to inform you that candidates in the schools listed will be requested to appear before the exam security committee for hearing, following principles of natural justice," Odongo wrote in his letter to the district authorities.

A cross-section of parents whose exam results were being withheld said they were beginning to despair after waiting for a prolonged period without hearing from UNEB. 

Mary Nanteza whose daughter was among the 100 affected candidates of Rapha ps said she had tentatively enrolled her daughter at a private secondary school in Kampala while waiting for UNEB's final decision.

The joyous mother said her daughter passed with an aggregate 5.

Over 91% passed PLE countrywide

UNEB last week said 91.8% of the 786,981 who sat PLE in 2024 passed and are fit to join secondary school.

Delivering the PLE 2024 results at State House Nakasero in Kampala on January 23, 2025, Odongo reported to First Lady and the Minister of Education and Sports Mrs Janet Museveni that out of these, about 84,000 candidates passed in Division One.

He said 397,589 passed in Division Two, Division Three (165,284), and Division Four (75,556), while 64,251 were ungraded or scored Grade ‘U’.

According to Odongo, 797,444 candidates from 14,883 centres (schools) registered for PLE in 2024 compared to 749,347 in 2023. He said over 10,000 of the candidates did not appear to sit for the exams.

He added that of this number, 524,025 (65.7%) from 11,451 centres were Universal Primary Education (UPE) beneficiaries, and 273,419 (34.3%) of the candidates from 3,432 centres were non-UPE.