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The West African Examinations Council (WAEC) sanctioned 13 Secondary Schools in Gombe State over cases of examination malpractice. From 2018 to 2020, seven public secondary schools were found to be involved in exam malpractice. In 2022, the Ministry received a fresh set of six schools that committed the same offence, and they were also de-recognised with a penalty of N500,000 per school payable to WAEC. According to WAEC director, the threat of examination malpractice had a negative impact on students' performance in the Senior Secondary Certificate Examinations result: with an overall average of 55.6% in 2022 compared to 79.5 per cent in 2021.

Academic dishonesty including dissertation fraud is on rise universities in Africa. Only 24 African countries out of 54 have institutional repositories. This means that dissertations and other sources of information that can be plagiarised only exist in hard copies. According to a professor from Uganda, one way to eliminate contract writing is to establish a rigorous process throughout the dissertation writing and defence process. The president of the Southern African Students Union believes that paying lecturers decent salaries will lead to a decrease in the number of people engaging in ghost-writing for students.

Not only have Nigerian students been cheating from each other for years, but also the plagiarised academic work hasn’t been included in any global database. In a report, Nigeria's Vice-President announced the new EagleScan anti-plagiarism software would improve the quality of research, teaching and learning in Nigeria and West Africa. He promised that the government would ensure that anti-plagiarism measures were fully implemented in the country's institutions.

Nigeria’s National Universities Commission (NUC) had discovered fake institutions in Benin awarding PhD degrees after students completed bogus studies in less than one year. According to NUC, academic projects and theses were sold for about NGN3,000 (about US$7.32) per copy, and sexual harassment was prevalent. Many of these fraudulent institutions are run by Nigerian proprietors who target students from Nigeria, where public universities struggle to accommodate a high number of qualified students seeking admission.

According to a professor from Nigeria’s Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), over 400 candidates seeking admission into higher education institutions across the country have been involved in admissions fraud. JAMB has discovered up to 96 cases of computer-based test irregularities in the North, with universities making changes to photographs and biometrics of candidates. This is contrary to a call by the Minister of Education who said institutions should not take any new photographs or biometrics of candidates after registration, in order to stop impersonations.

The cases of corruption in the education sector in Oyo State are ranging from reports of school administrators collecting money, students sitting mock exams, officials asking for grants from principals before distributing the school materials the government purchased for students to receiving money from teachers to deploy them to preferred areas. The governor announced that dismissal and prosecution awaited anyone who sabotaged government efforts through corrupt practices.

Exam malpractice is a highly organized "industry" between school proprietors, officials of the State Ministry of Education, officials of West African School Certificate examination, invigilators, machineries and the students themselves. According to a study, this is a result of poor implementation of examination rules, no fear of punishment, inadequate preparation for the exams, the disloyalty of examination body staff and students and parental threats. Many parents prefer to bribe the examiner rather than pay for extra lessons for their child, which may still not result in examination success.

The Commissioner for Education, Science and Culture says there are three major kinds of corruption in the West Africa’s educational system: manipulation of girls, favouritism when it comes to admission into higher institutions and sex for marks. Young girls often fall prey to teachers, among others “who make the education sector the worst hit by corruption. A scholarship programme has been put in place in order to protect these young girls and strengthen the educational terrain.

According to Transparency International, 66 per cent of the money Nigerian governments allocate to education is stolen by corrupt officials. Resource misallocation, corrupt procurement, exchange of sex for grades, examination malpractices, fake qualifications, teacher absenteeism, and corrupt recruitment practices are just some examples of the challenges the education systems is facing. This affects the quality of education, inclusion and learning outcomes with devastating consequences for national economic growth.