Report reveals how cartel raked in Sh1.3m in KCSE web of deceit

About Sh1.3 million was exchanged in a web of 120 mobile phones by rogue teachers, students and exam officers in attempts to access Form Four exam papers whose results will be announced on Wednesday, a government security report reveals. (READ: KCSE results to be released on Wednesday)

At the centre of this web were five secondary school teachers as the main actors.

One of them alone received more than Sh800,000 from desperate candidates and teachers after he promised to access and supply exam papers. (READ: Officials helping candidates cheat in KCSE exams)

But transactions involving the parties started two days after the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) exam kicked off on October 18, last year. A team of investigators, acting on a tip-off, contacted one Andrew Ndege, who was said to have been in possession of the exam materials.

(Ndege was charged in a Kisumu court on October 24 and imprisoned for one year without the option of a fine.)

According to a confidential report by the Kenya National Examinations Council (Knec), detectives and council officials established that Ndege had alleged that he was in a position to access and supply the KCSE questions.

They then pretended to be candidates and contacted him by proxy, where he said he would be willing to do so at a fee of Sh20,000 per paper, the report notes.

“He confirmed that he would send the questions the following day (October 21) if the money was sent to him. A deal was struck and the money sent via mobile phone,” the report reads.

At 5am on October 21 - a Friday - Ndege sent extracts of the Kiswahili questions that were to be taken the same day.

“When the paper was opened, the team confirmed the extracts to be true copies of the genuine paper — written in short form,” the officials said in the report.

He was located in Kisumu town and arrested on the same day around 7.30pm.

Upon arrest he said that he sat his KCSE examination in Konderobara Secondary School in 2008 and that they were supplied with examination materials then by a Mr Oluoch and that that their results were not cancelled even after accessing examination materials in advance.

Ndege was a useful lead as further investigations showed that the cartel was widespread and was collecting a lot of money via mobile phone money tranfer services from teachers, candidates and parents. (READ: Exam chiefs have eyes on six cheating ‘hot spots’)

Received Sh811,490

The report notes that investigations narrowed down to the main player — a teacher in Rongo, Nyanza, who had links spreading even to Nairobi and Mombasa.

Between October 17 and 22, last year, he received a total of Sh811,490 via M-Pesa from numbers that were all traced and found to have belonged to teachers and various candidates and parents.

Another teacher transacted a total of Sh208,820 while Ndege received a total of Sh54,595.
The network was later to rope in university students.

Kenyatta University students would access the examination materials from as early as 2am via text messages and they would then start texting to various candidates from different parts of the country.

“The KU students charged as little as Sh500 per text message to their recipients,” the report notes.

It adds: “The six KU students should be suspended for at least one year.”

In 2010, the council threatened to cancel results and ban cheats for two years before re-sitting the exam. However, the ban was later lifted.

The number of irregularities came down from 1,711 in 2009 to 534 in 2010.

The investigators now want Knec to cancel the results for all the candidates involved in examination irregularities and take appropriate disciplinary action against the teachers involved.