"O" Level Certification in Seychelles existed well before the 1980s

"Seychelles’ public education system has constantly been looking for the most effective system of assessing students’ performance since the 1980s.
For instance, much of the work done in the latter part of the 1980s, notably the Creighton Consultation Report of 1988 and the deliberations of the sub-committee on assessment in 1991, were seminal in paving the way for the introduction of the Ordinary Level General Certificate of Education (or O-level)"…….…..
(Seychelles Nation 12.01.2011

This reads like an awful warp of reality.
That the Ministry of Education was undertaking a review of student assessment in the 1980s is beyond doubt! However, it is a gross mistake to say that the 1988 Creighton report and the 1991 Assessment led to the introduction of the University of Cambridge “O” Level General Certificate of Education.(UCLES –GCE or GCSE –“O” Level)!

From well before the 1950s and up to the 1980s, the GCSE “O” Level was pretty much entrenched as THE assessment model for all students enrolled in a 5-year equivalent secondary education.

This was the case at the Seychelles College (successor to the St Louis College and King’s College of pre-1944 Education Act), and Regina Mundi, where the “O” level qualification was the key to securing the next Advanced Level High School Certificate of Education or “A” Level, itself the principal key to any University Study.

The post –1977 government of Seychelles turned away from the UCLES’ certification when in 1983, it closed down the Seychelles College and Regina Mundi Convent, the 2 principal Senior Secondary schools offering “O” Level qualification.

The suitability of the UCLES certification has been (and to some extent continues to be) a matter of contention among Pedagogues across the whole spectrum of cultures where the UK-based system is upheld. Most Secondary / High schools now tend to opt for the IGCSE certification.

Perhaps the closing down of the Seychelles College and the Regina Mundi and refutal of the “O”Level and “A” Level certification was a result of our own displeasure with the so-called “bourgeois” system. This however, is now a moot point in so far as the UCLES “O” level and “A” Level certification were re-introduced in the late 1980s at the ill-fated NYS of 1981.

In short, UCLES “O” Level was not introduced in the 1980s! It was there since well before. It was the certification that allowed most, if not all, of the current leaders in the Public Service, their ticket to Post Secondary and University qualifications.