Barring any last minute changes and subject to approval, the National Population Commission (NPC) will spend six dollars to count a citizen in the 2023 census.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports a Federal Commissioner of the NPC in Enugu State, Mr Ejike Eze made the disclosure on Sunday.
Mr Eze disclosed that the Commission had made a proposal to that effect, while dismissing claims that the N869 billion budgeted for the 2023 census exercise was exorbitant.
The Federal Commissioner argued that the N869 billion budget was the least when compared with the budgets of other countries for census.
“The U.S.A. spent between 12 dollars and 15 dollars (N5,760 –N7,200) to count a citizen, while Malawi spent nine dollars (N4,320) per citizen.
“In Nigeria, however, we are making a proposal to spend six dollars (N2,880) to count a citizen,” Eze said.
He went further to dismiss calls for a shift in the dates of the exercise and argued that census is not the same as election where there are competitors, winners and losers.
Eze, meanwhile, assured that the outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) will not be a threat to the 2023 national population and housing census scheduled for May 3 to May 5.
He said the group had sufficiently understood the need to allow residents to participate in the exercise to make it successful as doing otherwise would not help its cause.
He noted that the NPC had encounters with IPOB in two local government areas of Enugu State during the demarcation of the areas preparatory to the headcount, but the intervention by government resolved the issues.
“IPOB has on its own embarked on advocacy to encourage people to participate in the census.
“We have been able to engage IPOB to convince it that its agitation requires information that the census would provide,’’ Eze said.