2025 WASSCE Slump: Blaming Free SHS Is “Ill-Informed” — Bawumia Aide Fires Back
Bawumia aide urges technical probe into mass failures as over 96,000 candidates lose Core Maths passes and overall success rate slips below 50%
- Dennis Miracles Aboagye insists the Free SHS policy has no impact on teaching quality and should not be scapegoated for the poor results
- Over 96,000 candidates lost Core Mathematics passes in 2025, with the overall WASSCE pass rate dropping to 48.73%
- Stakeholders are urged to investigate the real academic causes of failures in Core Mathematics and Social Studies
Dennis Miracles Aboagye, a senior aide to former Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has dismissed claims that the Free Senior High School (Free SHS) policy is responsible for the poor performance recorded in the 2025 WASSCE, describing such arguments as “unintelligent” and misguided.
Speaking in an interview, on Wednesday, December 3, Aboagye called on education stakeholders to shift attention from political blame games to a more technical analysis of what truly caused the sharp decline in results.
According to him, Free SHS does not influence the quality of teaching or classroom delivery, stressing that teachers still use the same instructional methods and that the academic structure remains unchanged—except for the removal of school fees.
He urged policymakers, educators and examination authorities to critically examine the specific weaknesses that led to mass failures, especially in Core Mathematics and Social Studies, and to implement solutions to prevent a recurrence.
“Anyone who claims Free SHS caused these failures is being ill-informed. This debate must not be politicised. We must technically identify what went wrong in these two subjects and fix it,” he stated.
The 2025 West African Senior School Certificate Examination recorded one of the steepest declines in recent years. Passes (A1–C6) in Core Mathematics dropped by more than 96,000—from 305,132 in 2024 to 209,068 in 2025. The overall pass rate stood at just 48.73%, meaning more than half of candidates failed to qualify for tertiary education. Alarmingly, nearly one in every four candidates failed both Core Mathematics and Social Studies.
In spite of the worrying outcome, the University of Ghana has announced that it will maintain its admission cut-off points for the 2025/2026 academic year—deepening concerns about how many candidates will ultimately secure placement.
