2023 Census Postponement: Expenditure not wasted – NPC

The National Population Commission (NPC) says the expenditure toward the 2023 National Population and Housing Census is not wasted.

The NPC Federal Commissioner in charge of Delta, Chief Richard Odibo said this during a breakfast meeting for media executives on Thursday in Asaba.

Odibo said that former President Muhammadu Buhari approved the postponement of the 2023 Census earlier scheduled for between May 3 and May 7, commending the commission for the progress recorded so far.

”The expenditure so far on what we have been doing since 2013 is not wasted.

”Most of the items that we procured towards the census are all safeguarded at different state’s Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), states and local government offices.

”So much has been done and quite a lot has also taken place,” he said.

Odibo said that the commission welcomed the decision of the Federal Government to postpone the conduct of the census.

He said that the postponement would give the present administration the opportunity of having an input into the process.

”The postponement has given the commission the opportunity to further perfect its processes and systems for the conduct of the first ever digital census.”

The commissioner said that the breakfast meeting was to update media executives on the status of the preparation for the 2023 Census as well as the step forward in the light of the postponement.

Odibo said that the commission had carried out all the preparatory activities towards the conduct of the census.

He said that enormous human and material resources were expended on the implementation of the basic preparatory activities.

”The processes and systems put in place for the conduct of the census are currently being reviewed to determine what needs to be done to ensure that preparations do not become obsolete.

”The focus of the commission is to ensure that all the resources expended so far are safeguarded and that the nation does not need to start all over when the current administration would have approved a date for the conduct of the census,” he said.

Odibo said that the recruitment of ad-hoc staff was completed before the postponement.

He further said that the commission had commenced training of personnel before the postponement of the exercise.

According to him, a total of 13,814 enumerators and 2,846 supervisors have been trained.

”A total of 1,385 facilitators and 416 specialised workforce/quality assistants have also been trained.

”The commission has also trained 98 Training Centre Managers, 32 Data quality Managers, 26 local government training coordinators as well as 26 monitoring and evaluation personnel,” he added.

In his remarks, the State Director of the Commission, Mr Patrick Lotobi, said that to ensure credible census, the state office had been carrying out advocacy campaigns across the state.

Lotobi said that materials including generators, solar systems and jackets had been delivered to the state for the exercise adding that the commission was ready for the conduct of the census.