Martin Tako, Deputy Minister of General Education and Instruction/Photo/Lou Nelson

At least 24 candidates in Jonglei State’s Uror County have missed the ongoing nationwide Primary 8 exams as floods hampered delivery of the examination papers on Monday morning.

Martin Tako, the Acting Minister of General Education and Instruction said chartered planes were unable to find a landing space in Uror as the local airstrip is inundated and there is no suitable spot.

Mr Tako made the announcement while addressing candidates at Buluk Model Primary School during the commencement of the exams today.

He said flooding has submerged almost the whole area – making it difficult for planes to land despite several attempts to deliver the exams papers.

“Your Excellency (VP Abdelbagi), we could not sleep for the last two days, we have been contacting State authorities, the UNMISS, our partners and God granted us success with only one center in Jonglei State,” he said.

“The center in Uror county, with 24 candidates, has proven your Excellency beyond our control. The planes went several times, they could not find place for landing, the whole area is submerged in water.”

When contacted by Eye Radio, Simon Nyok, the Secretary General of the National Examinations Council confirmed that 24 candidates have missed the ongoing exams due to the flood situation.

“We have one center in Jonglei State that has not received the exams up to now because of the challenges of the weather around the county. The flood submerged the airfield they could not make any landing, so this is the challenge we have now with 24 candidates,” Nyok said.

He further said the Ministry will set another date for the candidates to take an “alternative exams.”

“We hope that we will put in place some arrangements to ensure that these candidates have the opportunities to do the exams.”

“We have alternatives as of today, we are going to fix the date of when we can offer them alternative paper, so we cannot communicate the date now because we have to do the printing of the alternative paper, so we will make sure that they sit in the shortest time possible.”

About 69,573 candidates of which 38,575 are males and 30,998 females were registered to sit for the exams in 1,665 schools from 551 centers across the country.