A Kampala school director who allegedly set and administered his own fake Primary Leaving Examinations (PLE) to unsuspecting pupils in 2020 has been arrested after evading police for two years.
Ivan Wafula even had the temerity to issue fake Uganda National Examinations Board (Uneb) PLE results to the victims that they have used at secondary level.
The scam was exposed when his former students failed to produce original results to register for their UCE exams.
Police have arrested Wafula, 34, the director of Earnest Nursery and Primary School in Kisugu Parish, Makindye Division, over a sophisticated academic forgery in which he reportedly duped parents and secondary schools with fake PLE results.
According to Kampala Metropolitan Police spokesperson SSP Patrick Onyango, Wafula in 2020 falsely claimed to have registered his P7 candidates for official PLE exams under the Uganda Uneb.
Instead, he allegedly took them to an unidentified location in Busia District, where they sat counterfeit exams that were not sanctioned by Uneb.
“After the fake exams, the pupils were brought back to Kampala, and the suspect issued them with forged results and recommendation letters, which they used to join different secondary schools,” Onyango said.
The scam only came to light in 2024 when administrators of Ebenezer Secondary School asked the students to present their original PLE results slips before registration for the Uganda Certificate of Education (UCE) exams.
When the students returned to Earnest Nursery and Primary School, Wafula failed to produce any authentic documents.
The matter was then reported to police, triggering a full investigation.
Detectives later confirmed that Earnest Nursery and Primary School had not registered any candidates with Uneb in 2020.
The forged results and recommendation letters were submitted to Uneb, which officially verified them as fake.
“Wafula has been on the run for about two years. Our intelligence teams tracked him down and arrested him yesterday. He is now detained at Jinja Road Police Station,” Onyango confirmed.
He said the suspect faces charges of forgery, uttering false documents, and obtaining money by false pretence.
Onyango urged parents to always verify their children’s examination registration and results directly with Uneb to avoid being deceived by dishonest school proprietors.
“Such fraudulent practices not only cheat parents but also destroy the futures of innocent children. We are sending a strong message that those involved in education-related fraud will face the full force of the law,” he added.
Police said investigations are ongoing to establish how many students were affected by the scam and whether any other accomplices were involved.