Mrs Bimbola Salu-Hundeyin, acting Chairman, National Population Commission (NPoPC), on Thursday reiterated the importance of census in the execution of government’s policies and programmes.
Salu-Hundeyin who spoke in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja, noted that adequate and correct data, would enable the government to provide the needed infrastructure.
She described census as mother of all data paramount in enhancing frugality and budgeting for government at all levels.
“Census gives you the gender, profession, age classification of citizens in an area.
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“If you have say 10 people living in an area, three are old people, while seven are under school age, then with the data, government will know that schools are needed more there for youths development,” Salu-Hundeyin said.
The chairman who restated calls for headcount , said that it would go a long way in resolving issues related to census.
She explained that with accurate census, there would be no need to speculate on Nigeria’s population.
“We have an ongoing Enumeration Area Demarcation (EAD) to determine the number of houses in particular areas,’’ she said.
Salu-Hundeyin said that the EAD which was a preparatory ground to census, was imperative for accurate counting of citizens.
She said that Nigeria recorded a 3.2 per cent of annual growth in between the last census, after elimination of births and deaths variables.
The population commission boss called on government to authorise a census, and affirmed the commission’s readiness to conduct credible census.
NAN reports that Nigeria conducted its last census in 2006, that put the country’s population at 140 million. (NAN)