Inside the hall, emotions ran high. Some pupils cried openly while parents struggled to process the decision. Despite appeals by local education leaders, officials said the ruling would not be reversed.
School Director, Matron Arrested as Police Investigate Case of P5 Boy Found Hanging in Dormitory
What was meant to be a proud moment for Kiira Primary School instead turned into a day of disbelief and tears.
Parents and pupils packed the school hall in Jinja City on Thursday expecting guidance about the next academic step. Instead, they received news that changed everything: 66 Primary Seven candidates would have to repeat the class after their Primary Leaving Examination (PLE) results were cancelled.
The decision came from the Uganda National Examinations Board (UNEB), which invalidated the results citing an unusual pattern in the Mathematics paper. Officials said the marks were not only high but also strikingly similar across many candidates, raising questions about the credibility of the performance.
The announcement was particularly shocking because the government-aided school had initially been celebrated as the best-performing examination centre in Jinja City. Early reports showed that all 67 candidates had scored Division One — an extraordinary result that quickly drew attention.
But after UNEB’s review, only one pupil’s results remained valid.
Inside the hall, emotions ran high. Some pupils cried openly while parents struggled to process the decision. Despite appeals by local education leaders, officials said the ruling would not be reversed.
City Education Officer Paul Baliraine explained that the pattern of scores in Mathematics had triggered alarm. Several candidates scored 80 marks and above, and when a sample of pupils was asked to reveal their marks during the meeting, none reported scoring below 50.
To the examinations board, that level of uniform performance was too unusual to ignore.
Baliraine acknowledged the pain the decision had caused but urged families to focus on the future.
“We know our children are bright. What happened hurts us all, but we should not remain stuck on one issue,” he told the gathering. “We have to accept what has happened and move on.”
For many parents, however, acceptance was not easy.
Maimuna Namwanga from Budondo said families felt unfairly punished for mistakes they did not commit.
“As parents we played our role. We should not be punished again for something we did not cause,” she said.
Others questioned why the entire cohort had to repeat the year. Hadijja Nalugoda, a resident of Ambercourt, suggested that UNEB could have reviewed only the Mathematics paper instead of cancelling the whole result.
She also worried about the impact on older pupils, especially girls.
“Our children have grown. Mine is a girl, and you know the challenges girls face as they grow older. I wanted her to finish school quickly,” she said.
Parents also voiced concern about the emotional toll on the learners. Tonny Amooti of Kayitabawala warned that the decision could seriously affect the pupils’ mental well-being.
“This situation can push children into depression or even worse,” he said. “It has shocked us as parents.”
School headteacher Rose Nakisige said the meeting had been organised to help families understand the situation and discuss the way forward.
“We counselled our parents and pupils to remain firm and move forward because they still have a future,” she said, adding that the school would follow guidance from supervisors and the city education office.
The incident unfolded within a broader examination cycle in which Jinja City registered 6,049 candidates for the 2025 PLE. Of these, 816 scored Division One, 3,269 Division Two, 929 Division Three, 535 Division Four, 434 were ungraded, and 67 were absent.
For the affected pupils at Kiira Primary School, however, those statistics offer little comfort. Their academic journey has paused unexpectedly — not because they failed, but because their success raised questions no one anticipated.
