Osinbajo Tasks NPC On Reliable Census

Nigeria’s Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo told a delegation of National Population Commission (NPC) that visited him today in Abuja that harmonization of demographic data was very important for national development planning, especially for the implementation of some of the government’s social investment plans.

“We must be able to honestly determine how many we are as a people,” Mr. Osinbajo’s spokesperson, quoted the vice president as having told the NPC team led by its Chairman Eze Duruheoma .

According to him, “having a reliable harmonized data base” will help social-economic planning including the Homegrown School Feeding Programme and the Conditional Cash Transfer, two of the several social investment plans of the Buhari administration.

The Vice President then tasked the Commission on conducting a reliable, cost-effective and acceptable census bearing in mind the irregularities that have trailed some of the previous census exercises.

“Technology has now made it possible to harmonize data,” the VP noted, adding that “with technology we can actually bring down the cost of data-gathering.”

He also noted that because of technology, data gathering has also become simpler, more efficient and cheaper.

Yemi Osinbajo said, having a single platform for data management in the country is very important for national planning and economic development.

In his presentation earlier, the NPC’s chairman, Eze Duruheoma, said the Commission was working with other agencies and stakeholders including the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) to produce a single platform of data management for the country.

Eze Duuheoma noted that the national population register about to be put up by the population commission would be the primary source of data as it would give reliable identification of the citizens from the “cradle to the grave.”