Recently, disturbing images and videos have flooded social media showing that Nigerian students write their Waec exams late at night. In several parts of the country, they relied on candles and phone torches due to prolonged power outages and serious delays. Many students would have waited in their centers from the beginning of the afternoon until 9 p.m., some started their English language papers until 10 p.m., after waiting for hours without invigitors, instructions or information.
This incident is more than a logistical failure. It is a moral and structural accusation of the current state of the Nigeria education system. What makes this moment particularly powerful is not only what happened, but on the way history has broken. It was not discovered by official declarations or press releases. It was made visible through tweets, photos and testimonies from parents and students themselves. These citizens, armed with smartphones and the desire to speak, have transformed what could have been another hidden failure in a public calculation.
In today’s world, the ability to reveal the truth is power. Institutions traditionally shape the stories, control information and define what matters as “normal”. In Nigeria, where public education has long struggled under the weight of under-funding, mismanagement and political neglect, these failures are often endured discreetly. But this time, the Nigerians decided to make it impossible to diversify the gaze.
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There is something deeply symbolic in students who pass exams in darkness. It represents more than just lack of electricity. It reflects a broader type of darkness, a lack of responsibility, a lack of protection and a lack of care of those who are entrusted in the future of young people. The candle has not only become a lighting source, but a symbol of resistance. He showed the determination of students to continue, even in humiliating conditions. But that also raised a painful question. Why should they do it?
In a country where the government often presents itself as working to reform education and improve standards, these images tell a different story. They show children abandoned by systems that are supposed to support them. They reveal institutions that do not even meet the most basic expectations of security, time management and communication. Parents who stand outside the centers in darkness, watching their children, remind us that in the absence of institutional care, people are forced to create their own forms of protection.
The real crisis here is not only that the students wrote in the dark. It is that no one in charge seemed to consider this unacceptable. There was no excuse, no emergency response, no visible consequences. This silence speaks volumes about the nature of power in the country. When those who are supposed to serve the public feel no urgency to explain or correct such a massive failure, this means that it does not expect to be held responsible.
But something else changes. The audience looks and they express themselves. This incident reveals a change in the way ordinary people take up the power to define their own truths. Citizens use social media to document, question and put pressure on institutions to recognize their failures. Where traditional power structures once had a quasi-monopoly on visibility and control, they are now challenged by new forms of digital resistance.
It is no longer enough for the authorities to reject these events as unhappy or isolated. These incidents are part of a wider diagram, which reflects a deeper institutional decrease. Delayed examinations at early morning test hours, students are subject to increasingly inhuman conditions. However, it is they who will be judged by their examination results, while those who fix these conditions remain undeniable.
This imbalance must be treated. We cannot speak of national development or education reform if we continue to tolerate such contempt for students’ lives. We cannot ask young people to give the best exams when we do not give them the most basic tools to succeed: light, security, dignity.
What the Waec Candlelight incident finally shows is that power is not fixed. It can be disputed, redirected and exposed. It also shows that the truth, when it is revealed by those who live it, carries its own power. Nigerians are no longer willing to suffer in silence. They look, record and demand better.
