To write about evaluation in contemporary education systems in Africa is a daunting task, since any generalizations that one might make could easily be challenged by instances in which they did not hold. This is because Africa, even if one focuses on the area south of the Sahara, exhibits great variety in the traditional cultural institutions and practices of the many ethnic groups that inhabit it, and in the extent to which these groups were in contact with non-African cultures. Variety in any of these conditions might go some way towards accounting for the current state of education on the continent, and for variation in attitudes towards, and the practice of, evaluation.