Allegations of fraud involving at least 2 000 papers written in this year’s matric year-end examinations were under investigation, Mpumalanga police said on Tuesday.
”Information is streaming in, and the figure could rise,” said Superintendent Izak van Zyl.
Investigators have been approached by 13 possible witnesses since news of the alleged fraud broke last week, and statements were being taken from them.
By Tuesday, information kept coming in from pupils, examination markers, departmental officials and teachers, Van Zyl said.
”After taking all the statements, we will build a dossier, after which we will be able to apply to a court for arrest warrants.”
Van Zyl said it was ”quite possible” that senior education department staff might be among those arrested. The first arrests could come ”rather soon” depending on progress with the witness statements.
Pupils involved in the alleged fraud would also face criminal charges, he added.
Last Thursday, provincial police seized every single examination script written by this year’s Mpumalanga matrics as part of the investigation –prompted by a report the previous day by an exam marker of suspected irregularities.
This led examination controlling body Umalusi to announce that the province’s matric results would be withheld until at least the second week in January — by when the probe was expected to be completed.
The results of the rest of the country are to be announced on Wednesday.
The police investigation initially covered examinations written in the subjects of English (first language), physics, chemistry, agricultural science, business economics, geography and tourism.
But Van Zyl said on Tuesday that mathematics, Afrikaans (second language), biology, history and accounting had been added to the list.
Pupils at six schools were under suspicion — two in Nelspruit and one each in White River, Morgenzon, Groblersdal and Middelburg. Hundreds of pupils are feared to have been involved.
Van Zyl said the probe focused on claims that memoranda containing answers to the questionnaires had been made available — possibly sold –to pupils.
A prima facie case had already been established, he added.
Examination controlling body Umalusi declined to comment on Tuesday, saying it would give an update only after receiving final reports from the police, the provincial education department and its own investigators.
The provincial department could not immediately be reached for comment.
The Democratic Alliance called for an independent commission of inquiry to investigate claims that matric results were influenced by political pressure.
The party’s Mpumalanga branch, meanwhile, has asked the Speaker of the provincial legislature to reconvene the body for a special debate on what it termed the ”matric exam crisis”.
”Politics should not be able to influence the results of the most important examinations in South Africa’s school system,” it said in a statement.
”A person’s chance of passing or failing should not depend on who the minister is. This must be an objective decision made by properly qualified educationists marking matric papers according to objective criteria.”
The Mpumalanga allegations, ”apparently involving collusion between schools and the department” should form part of the probe, the party said.
It should also look at claims that the difficulty of questions in matric examination papers had declined in the past ten years and that South African students’ performance in mathematics had dropped despite an increase in the matric pass rate.
Another area to be investigated was the introduction of benchmark tests for university admission because the current matric certificates were not deemed adequate indicators of a student’s ability, the party said.
A failure to institute a wide-ranging probe into these issues would fuel public scepticism and ”continue to devalue a certificate that once opened many doors”, the DA said. – Sapa