The Federal Commissioner, National Population Commission, NPC, in Kwara State, Abdulrazaq Folorunsho Gidado, has promised Nigerians that the 2023 population and housing census project will be held this year.
Abdulrasak described the census as one of Nigeria’s critical and topical issues, maintaining that it would become a thing of the past because it will hold this year.
The NPC Commissioner revealed that the board of the NPC has taken necessary moves to reach out to President Ahmed Bola Tinubu to get his backing on the project.
He said the Chief of Staff to the President, Mr Femi Gbajabiamila, and the Secretary to the Federation, Mr George Akume, among other personal aides, have been consulted to discuss the project with the president.
Gidado revealed that the Governor of Kwara State, Malam Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, has also been consulted on the need for a census exercise this year.
Speaking at a breakfast meeting with media executives on the 2023 census in Ilorin on Tuesday, June 13, the commissioner said the vast funds sunk into the census project would not be allowed to go down the drain.
He hinted that the NPC fully supported the postponement of the exercise by the previous government of Muhammadu Buhari to allow the new government of Tinubu to have an input in the exercise.
Abdulrasak also revealed that technology would be deployed for the country’s first digital census exercise, which will assist in getting accurate, verifiable and acceptable figures that would benefit the country.
