The House of Representatives has said it will investigate how the National Population Commission, NPC, spent N200 billion out of the N800 billion the previous administration released for the postponed 2023 census.
The resolution followed the unanimous adoption of a motion co-sponsored by Dominic Okafor (APGA, Anambra) and Patrick Umoh (APC, Akwa Ibom) at plenary on Wednesday.
The census earlier scheduled for May 3–7 was postponed indefinitely with the past information minister Lai Muhammed saying the census will be conducted by President Bola Tinubu’s administration which took off at the end of May. It was the second postponement to this year’s census.
The last time Nigeria had a headcount was 17 years ago.
Okafor noted that the data collected in the 2006 census is far from reality today and cannot validly form a solid base for the formation of national economic policies that will aid the federal government in administering viable national planning.
The lawmakers urged President Tinubu to fix a new date for the census urgently.
“If the population and housing census fails to take place within 12 months, the information gathered across the country would become stale, a waste of resources, and the country would have to increase costs of gathering fresh information,” Okafor argued.
In August, the NPC expressed readiness to conduct the census, saying it is awaiting orders from President Tinubu.
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