LEAKAGES OF EXAMINATION PAPERS (Statement by the Minister for Education)

10.10 a.m.

Mr Chew Swee Kee: Mr Speaker, Sir, at the December sitting of this Assembly I made a statement on the English Secondary Schools Entrance Examination leakage and the Government Chinese Senior Middle III Examination leakage and promised to make a fuller statement on the Chinese Examination leakage, the investigation of which was not completed at that time. A thorough investigation of the administrative arrangements for the setting of papers and the printing has revealed the following facts:-

(1) The seven question papers were set by seven different persons, five of whom were in the Ministry, one in an English secondary school and one in the Teachers' Training College.

(2) The seven question papers were given to a professor from Nanyang University for the purpose of moderation by certain professors in the University.

(3) The seven question papers were moderated by six professors of Nanyang University, each of them dealing with only one paper with the exception of one who dealt with two papers.

(4) On the return of the question papers from Nanyang University, the persons who set the questions made certain amendments to the questions and in one paper which went up to Nanyang University in English the questions were translated into Chinese in the Ministry. The final form of the questions was determined in my Ministry only after the questions had returned from Nanyang University, and thus the professors up at the University did not know the final form of the questions. The questions that leaked out were in their final form.

(5) All these question papers were sent to the Government Printing Office for printing. The proofs were checked by the setters themselves and returned to the Printing Office for final printing.

(6) The packing of the printed papers was supervised by three officials of the Ministry at the Printing Office and brought back personally by them to the Ministry.

(7) During this period from the setting of the first questions until the delivery of the printed papers, they were kept in the custody of the Assistant Examinations Officer.

(8) The Government Printer has accounted for all the papers printed by him either in proof or in final form.

The revelation of the above facts should have brought about the exposure of the culprit or culprits, but unfortunately this has been made impossible by the attitude of the witnesses.

The appeal to students and others to come forward to give information with regard to the leakage has been disappointing. Although many pupils who had been in possession of the questions had been interrogated, none of them was prepared to speak the whole truth. Invariably the final answers were either that they obtained the questions anonymously through the telephone, through the post or from collective copying in a coffee shop or at some other place. Even those who had come forward to surrender some of the questions before the examination were not prepared to give further information. They said that their object was to prove to the Government that there had been a leakage of questions so that the dishonest students would not get their qualifications through foul means. They said that their objective had been achieved and they, therefore, did not want to go further to put anybody in trouble, in face of this attitude no one can force any of them to say anything against their will but I want to take this opportunity, not to condemn the perverted sense of loyalty to friends among the Chinese school students, but to ask them to sit back and reflect whether they were doing the right thing as citizens of this country and whether the loyalty and sincerity they learned in the classics taught them to shield those who have conspired to cheat in an examination at national level and frustrate the efforts of the Government. I hope that our educationists will take note of this and see to it that our children do not misinterpret the meaning of loyalty and sincerity.