The Public Accountants Examinations Board (PAEB) of the Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Uganda has released the August 2023 CPA (U) examination results.
The examination results were officially released by CPA Josephine Okui Ossiya, President of ICPAU and CPA Laura Aseru Orobia, PAEB Chairperson, on Monday during the release of the results at Skyz Hotel in Naguru.
This is the second examination diet under the new syllabus. ICPAU has also been able to conduct Paper 18 -Integration of Knowledge examination (Paper 18) as a computer-based examination.
ICPAU CEO, CPA Derick Nkajja, in his welcome remarks, started by introducing the new council and examination board.
“I would like to take this opportunity to announce that we have a new council. The last time we were here, we had a different council and Public Accountants Examinations Board,” he said.
In her remarks, CPA Laura Aseru Orobia, chairperson of PAEB, said the examinations were conducted from Monday 21 August to Friday 25 August 2023.
“There are 3,919 candidates who sat these examinations. Clearly, we had more females 2,144 (54.7%) than males 1,775 (45.5%) sitting for the August 2023 examinations,” said Orobia.
CPA Orobia noted that the subject pass rate for female candidates was 34.1% whereas that of their male counterparts was 31.5% which shows that female candidates performed better than their male counterparts did.
“The girl child is winning. Big ups to the ladies,” she noted, adding that the average subject pass rate is 32.9% compared to 32.6 in June 2023.
She added: “We are happy to announce that 13 (61.9%) of the top candidates are female and 8 (38.1%) are male. Even the top candidate at the final level is female.”
The cumulative number of students who have completed the CPA course now stands at 4,958 i.e., female 1,942 (39.1%) and male 3,016 (60.9%).
“64 candidates completed the CPA course; 35 (54.7%) being female and 29 (45.3%) males. Clearly, the girl child is shining,” she noted.
She, however, pointed out that the curve of performance declines with the advancement in the levels, explaining that papers in the lower levels register better performance compared to the papers in the higher levels.
“It is important to note that job positions & tasks require computer skills such as the use of email, word processors, spreadsheets, slide show presentations, portable document format (PDF), zipping files and internet navigation,” she stated.
On her part, ICPAU President, CPA Josephine Okui Ossiya, advised students to be intentional and focused so as to pass these exams.
“The pass rate is still very low. We need to increase this,” she pointed out.
Overall performance
For the August diet, ICPAU noted poor performance of pass rate below 20% in Financial Management – Paper 8 (13.2%), Advanced Financial Reporting – Paper 12 (18.5%), Public Financial Management – Paper 13 (12.3%) and Advanced Financial Management – Paper 15 (15.7%).
In Level 1 subjects (Paper 1 to Paper 6), it was a 50:50 performance. However, there was a significant gender difference in Financial Accounting, and Management and Information Systems.
In Level 2 subjects (Paper 7 to Paper 11), the female candidates performed better than their male counterparts in 03 out of the 05 papers.
In Level 3 subjects, (Paper 12 to Paper 17), the female candidates performed better than their male counterparts in 05 out of the 06 papers.
Level 4 has only one paper and the females posted better performance than the male candidates.
Overall, the subject pass rate for female candidates was 34.1% whereas that of their male counterparts was 31.5%.