The department of basic education has revealed that it was a university student who runs a project helping matriculants with their studies who alerted the department about the mathematics paper 2 leak.

Chief director of national assessment and public examination  Dr Rufus Poliah, who was talking during the media briefing on the update of ongoing examinations on Wednesday morning said the student immediately sent an e-mail to the department’s spokesperson Elijah Mhlanga at about 1.37am on Monday morning.

“Mhlanga received a full maths question paper and he called me in the morning requesting for me to establish the veracity of the question paper and we were able to confirm that it was indeed the maths paper that was going to be written on that morning. According to the student he got the paper from four pupils in Gauteng who requested him to help them to answer some questions; however, he refused and alerted the department,” Poliah said.

Poliah said the department will still determine the origins of the leak as eight of the nine provinces are affected.

“The department still has to establish the extent of the leak which will determine whether the paper will be re-written.  The department will conduct interviews with candidates, audit exam centres and also make use of the expertise of an IT company to assist with the tracing of WhatsApp messages. We have also approached the Hawks to identify the source of leakage,” he said.

Minister of basic education Angie Motshekga said they were very disappointed that a question paper has been leaked and some pupils appear to have had access to it before it was written.

“The penalty related to examinations are very serious. As a learner you can be banned for up to three years from writing the national senior candidate exams and if you are an employee in the system, you can be jailed.