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THE National Population Commission (NPC) has warned its field officers engaged for the trial census for the 2023 Population and Housing Census against falsifying data during the exercise scheduled to hold between June 27 and July 30.
Nasir Kwarra, the Executive Chairman, NPC gave the warning in Gombe on Tuesday while briefing the trainees at the opening ceremony for the training of functionaries for the trial census.
Kwarra who was represented by Abubakar Danburam, the Federal Commissioner, NPC, Gombe State, said it was a criminal offence for any of the field personnel to falsify data in view of the negative impacts such would have on the exercise.
He said the sensitive nature of the exercise was the reason the commission always invites magistrate for Oath of Secrecy to guide against falsification of data or giving information to the public.
The NPC boss said falsification of data and disclosure of information to the public would not be treated with levity as the commission would not hesitate to take action against such person(s).
“It is dangerous to go against the oath of secrecy.
“We want our enumerators not to sit under the trees and ‘cook’ figures; we will pick them up and replace them with good hands,” he said.
“The information for the trial census is not going to form part of the 2023 census,” he said.
Kwarra said the commission had taken measures to ensure that the objectives of the exercise were not undermined as “monitoring and evaluation” instruments had been developed to assess the extent to which objectives were being met or not.
He said the quality of the personnel for the trial census would greatly impact on its outcomes, hence the need to properly train the enumerators and supervisors.
Kwarra said the training would empower the personnel on the necessary skills with practical demonstrations of operations in the field aimed at delivering a truly scientific trial exercise to prepare the ground for a credible and acceptable census in 2023.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that a total of 105 personnel comprising 90 field enumerators, nine supervisors and six facilitators would be trained in Gombe State for the trial census.
The trial census is one of the key preparatory activities for the census.
It is a process in which all census operations are tested in a detailed and comprehensive manner.
This takes place as a matter of best practice about a year to the actual census date to assess the different scenarios that may be presented during the main census.(NAN)
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Tags: Abubakar Danburam Nasir Kwarra NPC
