Candidates writing the Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) in the Bolgatanga Municipality converged at their various Examination Centres to write their maiden external examinations for admission into Senior High School.

About 19,873 candidates are expected to write this year’s BECE in the Upper East Region. Out of the number, about 9,820 are male candidates while about 10,053 are females.

Ms Jane Sabina Obeng, the Upper East Regional Director of Education who inspected some of the centres this morning expressed joy at the level of discipline exhibited by the candidates in the various examination centres and entreated them to continue with that until they finished with all the nine papers.

The candidates are being examined in subjects including English and Ghanaian Languages, Social Studies, Integrated Science, Mathematics, Basic Design and Technology, Religious and Moral Studies, as well as French. The candidates who commenced the examination with English Language Paper are expected to end their final examination this Friday.

Some candidates were however absent from some examination centres when the Ghana News Agency (GNA) visited these centres this morning.

Two students were absent at the Zuarungu Senior High school Centre ‘A’ and ‘B’ in the Bolgatanga Municipality.

A total of 510 students from 14 Junior High schools in that circuit were expected to undertake the BECE

A visit to two of the designated centers at the Zuarungu Senior high school campus at about 0840 hours showed anxiety in some of the candidates who were patiently waiting for the arrival of the question papers to the centre.

Mr Allan Adombire, examination supervisor at Centre ‘A’ giving a breakdown of the candidates population said 279 students registered for the BECE, and according to him, out of the number, 132 were males and one of them was absent while the females were 147.

At Centre ‘B’, one girl was missing out of the total of 131 registered candidates expected to write.

According to Mr Augustine Atusbora, an invigilator at the centre, 127 females and 103 males were present at the centre to undertake the Examination.

At the Zamse Senior High Technical School (ZAMSTEC) Centre, about 906 candidates were posted to the centre comprising 438 males and 468 females. Three females and two males were absent.

The condition of candidates at the Bolgatanga Senior High School (BIGBOSS) was not too different as one female candidate was absent out of the 396 candidates sent to that examination centre in the Talensi District.

That centre has 206 males and 190 females.

The GNA observed that there were no hitches regarding logistics for the examination including examination materials and the arrival of candidates and invigilators as invigilators from the various Centres, Mr Joseph Wuni Bugri and Mr Blaise Dery from the BigBoss and Zamstec Centres respectively confirmed sanity at the centres as of the time of filing this report.