The West African Examinations Council has attributed delays in the conduct of some papers in the 2026 West African Senior School Certificate Examination to a fatal road accident that killed three of its officials and a combination of security and logistical challenges.

Head of Public Affairs Moyosola Adesina disclosed this in a statement on Monday, confirming that the three officials died on Wednesday, June 3, 2026, in a collision along the Gombe Yola highway while transporting sensitive examination materials across states.

"This heartbreaking loss, coupled with prevailing regional security challenges, severely compromised our distribution schedule, which inadvertently led to the delayed start times. While we mourned our fallen colleagues, our team of indefatigable staff worked around the clock to deploy emergency contingency measures to ensure that the examination was still conducted in the affected areas," the council stated.

The disruption was most visible in Oyo, Lagos, and Osun states, where candidates sitting the Mathematics and Agricultural Science papers last Wednesday and Thursday were forced to write their examinations late into the evening. In several centres, students relied on torchlights, mobile phone flashlights, and solar powered lamps to complete their papers after 8 pm, while others moved outside classrooms to take advantage of available light.

WAEC disclosed that preliminary investigations pointed to multiple contributing factors beyond the accident, including security challenges that triggered mass protests over the abduction of schoolchildren in some areas, delays in the finalisation of examination arrangements, and the late registration of candidates, which affected the timely production of materials.

"Security challenges which led to mass protests against the abduction of schoolchildren also affected the timely distribution of examination materials despite the council's best efforts," the statement read.

The council assured the public that measures had been put in place to prevent further disruptions, pointing to the smooth conduct of examinations on Friday, June 5, as evidence that the challenges had largely been resolved.

The 2026 May/June WASSCE for school candidates, which commenced on Tuesday, April 21, is scheduled to conclude on Friday, June 19, 2026.