Michael Warutere of Riara Springs in Nairobi’s Imara Daima scored 428 marks to emerge the top candidate. Warutere also spoke to the press, expressing his excitement after beating more than 1.4 million candidates to become the top candidate. The brilliant candidate who confessed he was not expecting the exemplary results said he aspires to be a Software Engineer. “I am still in disbelief that I am the one who is standing here. I hope that I will make it to Mang’u High School,” he said. Warutere said though he has been performing well throughout the year, he did not even, in his wildest dreams, expect to be the top candidate. “As a private school student, this was a big surprise; I thought the best candidate would be from a public school,” he said.
As the country bade farewell to the KCPE, MPs wanted the challenges bedeviling the new curriculum addressed. “As we exit the KCPE and KPSEA comes in, there are a number of teething issues which I know the presidential working party addressed so let us embrace it. It is going to ensure the talent of the child is key, not only academics,” Julius Melly, the National Education Committee chairperson said. Joe Nyutu, Senate Education Committee chairperson said: “As we usher in the CBC, let’s ensure that never again will learners be assessed on only one parameter of academics because all of us are gifted differently, talented differently and that’s why I’m an ardent supporter of CBC.” Speaking yesterday, Dr David Njengere, the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) chief executive, said the 39-year journey of KCPE has seen some 26 million candidates take the examination, among them, some 103,000 non-citizens.
