The National Council of State on Thursday approved April 2023 as date for the national population census.
The Director-General of National Population Commission (NPC), Nasir Isa-Kwarra, who spoke with the State House Correspondents after a meeting of the Council of State presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday, said the exercise would come after the general elections.
According to him, the NPC would be conducting a pilot census from June 2022 after political parties must have concluded their pre-general elections activities.
The NPC boss, who recalled the last census exercise held in 2006, disclosed that the commission will deploy high technology for the exercise.
He said through census data is generated for planning, noting that the data currently being used are mere projections and obsolete.
He said: “It is very crucial because I have highlighted that the census is a very important exercise for the nation.
“Because through census we generate the data that we use for policy making, for planning, for development, by the three tiers of government, and the private sector, they all need this.
“If you are a private sector, you’re producing something, certainly, you need to know the population of an area if you want to create a market there.
“So census data is very crucial, very important. Because, the data we’ve been using are just projections, estimation. And are sort of obsolete, we need the actual census data to use for our planning.“
