Nigeria postpones its long-awaited national census pending the new administration

29 Apr. (EUROPE PRESS) –

The still president of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, has announced the postponement of the great national census initially scheduled for May 3 to 7, pending a new date once the new administration led by his successor, Bola Tinubu, is consolidated.

The president has given his approval for the postponement after meeting with some members of the Federal Executive Council and the president of the National Population Commission, Nasir Isa Kwarra, accompanied by his team, at the Presidential Villa in Abuja this past Friday, reports the ‘Premium Times’.

Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, has been postponing this new census since 2021 due to the enormous insecurity caused by criminal groups operating in the country, the so-called “bandits”, whose practices of kidnapping, extortion and murder have terrorized the population of remote locations.

United Nations estimates suggest that more than 400 million people could live in Nigeria by 2050, which would make the African country the third most populous in the world, ahead even of the United States.

Nigeria has gone 17 years without a new census, an almost essential instrument for dealing with a huge variety of administrative issues and the distribution of wealth in the country.

In any case, this census is expected to last less than a week, as the National Population Commission advanced in January, whose president assured citizens that there will be no “room for manipulation” thanks to the use of new counting technologies, such as the use of new satellite positioning systems.