Adebayo Adenrele
…as NPC demands date for exercise, additional N225.2b for logistics
President Bola Tinubu has pledged his unwavering support for the National Population Commission (NPC) to conduct a credible and accurate Population and Housing Census in the Country.
Tinubu, in a statement by his Special Adviser on Special Duties, Communication and Strategy, Dele Alake, stated this in Abuja after receiving a briefing from NPC Chairman, Nasir Isa Kwarra.
President Tinubu expressed concern on the delay since the last exercise in 2006, adding that there is a need for the commission to be prudent in their assignment and work towards producing census data that would be credible and reliable.
In his words, “It is disappointing that up until now we have not been able to conduct another enumeration of our people. I hope that this delay will be converted to a great opportunity in this electronic and digital age.
”The challenge is yours and I hope that during the demarcation you did, you would have noticed the migration of people to urban centers because of the extreme poverty and unemployment.
”Digitalizing the process will make your job easier and I don’t see why we don’t, by now, have a reliable database in Nigeria to identify ourselves and ascertain our numbers for planning purposes and in time of disaster.
”I have listened to you and we will support you. Accuracy and integrity of your data is very important to Nigerians and for our national economic development programmes.
”We will support you but you have to be prudent and be determined to make a name for yourself. Goodluck, ” the President said.
In his remarks, the NPC Chairman requested the issuance of a proclamation for a new Census date later this year or early next year.
He said the commission had demarcated the entire country, stating that only one or the two places were left, which will be done soon.
Kwarra noted that the Commission was on the verge of conducting the final training for the Census before they were restricted by the transition programme for a new government and funding challenges, necessitating the postponement of the exercise by former President Muhammadu Buhari.
In a paper titled “Implementation Status of the 2023 Population and Housing Census,” the NPC requested the President’s approval for an additional N225.2 billion to cover training and fieldwork allowances, retraining of trainers, and the conduct of a second-class Trial Census.
He noted that the Commission had requested the release of the allocated N31 billion capital allocation, in the 2023 budget, for preparatory activities, which later resulted to N546.72billion total cost of the Census after a methodology review.
”NPC having completed Mapping in March 2022, tested the market with the geospatial data by making it available to researchers at a ‘test price’ where it generated over N50 million through REMITA.
”To this end, with a full integrated spatial and statistical data, government geospatial policy and coordination, NPC can generate up to 14 billion dollars and further save a lot of resources for the nation through automation of economic planning by 2028,” he said.
