 President Mohammed Buhari has approved the postponement of the 2023 population and housing census earlier scheduled for 3 to 7 of May 2023. Now, to a date that is being determined by the incoming administration, the president gave the approval after a meeting with some members of the federal executive council and the chairman of the National Population Commission at his team at the presidential villa in Abuja on Friday the 28th of April 2023. Now, in arriving at the decision to postpone the census, the meeting retrated the critical need for the conduct of a population and housing census 17 years after the last census to collect up-to-date data that will drive the developmental goals of the country and improve the living standard of the Nigerian people. Now, he also commended the methodology being put in place by the commission to conduct accurate and reliable census, especially the massive deployment of technology that is capable of delivering world-class census and laying a sustainable basis for future censuses. Well, joining us to discuss this is Biada Shoumi, a political analyst and a veteran journalist. Thank you so much for joining us, Mr. Shoumi. Good evening. Thank you for having me. Good evening. Great. Well, the president and the presidency has, they have underlined and emphasized the importance and the critical nature in which we need to make sure that we have this population census conducted. So my first question would be why why now shifted to the next administration when it's still within your purview to conduct it? Look, there's no doubt census source is very important. It's critical to planning, national planning and planning at subnational level with the view to determine or to predict what social infrastructures and educational needs to be provided over a period of time. So it's also a good predictor to for the purpose of national planning to determine the level of growth that the economy must attain in order to who create employment opportunities for the citizens. Know that it is very important. But this time around, these censors, just like other ones, run into a big each. There was a huge public distrust between the populace and governments generally. And many people thought with the way many people came into the country from neighboring West African countries, and some of them have money to obtain the national identity number. So they they they began to query why the administration, which is on its last lap, should have an interest in conducting census. There were also other imputed motives, financial motives in terms of maybe people wanted to pay off from the economy. And that's why they do. So it was becoming, you know, wrapped in in a crisis of trust and distrust. So because of that, it became inevitable that government has to postpone it, no matter what the thing. If you can't rush it, it will run into it to be totally discredited. We need to know the number of us. Yes, obviously. But one thing we have not, we are running away from is the fact that we need to move away from the days of assault when it's accounted. You can easily use technology to do all these things, particularly. I knew that you I knew that you were going to say this. So I was waiting for this point. We know that technology can do this, but we have had technology with us for so many years. In fact, under this whole administration, we've talked about technology and the use of technology, but how well have we used it? For example, I'm sure, Mr. Show me, you can actually understand where I'm going. When you want to get your license renewed, you do biometrics. You want to get an ATM card. You go and capture. You want to register a SIM card. You do the same thing. You want to get your NIN. You do this. It's the same process. So if we have this much data and we've never used it, but we keep collecting this data and nothing is being done, who's to say that we can do the same thing or deploy the same data or technology in terms of our sensors? Why not revert to the same old same old head counting? Yes, we are correct. We've been collecting loads of data from different people and storing them in different systems. What we've not done is to integrate all the systems together. For instance, there's no reason why your NIN cannot reveal the details of your bank account of not exactly how much you have in the account that you have an account in so-so place where your biometrics has also been taken or that you have a driving license. This is it. And it will give you all those information. It's not impossible. It's something being done elsewhere. You know, that applies. Why we're not doing it? I don't understand. Then we also need to look at our laws in a way that we can ensure that the states can synchronize their data base through mutual agreement. For instance, if you commit a traffic offense in Lagos, all you simply need to do is move to or your state, you know, and change your registration. There's no way how you'll be held accountable for that traffic offense once you are not doing, you are not renewing your registration in Lagos. That should not be the case. It should be a situation where no matter where you go, you'll still be made to pay the penalty, which will be remitted to Lagos. So that will involve legislation. It will also involve, you know, negotiations and agreement amongst the government. So we still have some ways to go in terms of integrating our data in a way that we can use it meaningfully. For me, I think the national identity number, NIN, is merely enough. With NIN, all what we need to do is get all Nigerians to register for NIN. Because it's unique. It's only unique to you. No one else can have it. Through that, you can easily predict the number of people living in a particular area. Unlike the current system we have, we want to do exact account. In terms of the houses, they don't need to go too far. The state's government, well, I don't know whether it's universal in Nigeria, but at least in some states, I know in Lagos and Kutun, they have, they've already enumerated the houses. They all have identification numbers. So they know because they are paying land use checks. So they already know how many houses they have. So if this is the situation, we should encourage other state government to do the same thing so that we already have the data for purpose of national planning. So I don't think we need to keep spending billions and trillions on counting heads all the time. Nobody can have an exact, accurate number of anybody living anywhere, even in UK or US. What they do is they use technology and use some other means to try and get an average idea, a clear idea of how many people are living here. Not exactly the exact amount of people living in any particular area. So that is why it's a bit strange that we're still thinking in the midst of our economic crisis to spend over a trillion on this exercise, rather than put it into the economy, provide infrastructure and use some other means to collect the data which are badly needed. Let's talk about the politics of this. As much as, you know, the director of the National Population Commission, Inua Dalingu has said that the reason why government is postponing this is because of the post-election mood in the country. And you talked about the fact that there's a trust deficit. And with this cancellation again, there's always been that politic side to our numbers across the country, especially when we talk about the North. Many people have debated why some of these numbers are inflated, allegedly, because they want to use it for political reasons. And we have just come out of an election that has raised all sorts of eyebrows and has, you know, and we said all kinds of comment. With the push of this census, who's to say that the incoming administration would prioritize it? And again, how can we get that trust deficit to be turned, you know, to get a U-turn of sorts so that people can begin to trust the numbers, people can begin to be certain that when government says this is the thing, it actually is that, as opposed to always, you know, giving a side-eye to it. Yes, no doubt it has its own usefulness, politically speaking, because once you do a numberation, what they call the lineation of constituencies, you can now delineate because people move from one place to the other over a period of time. So you might have a situation, for instance, say in Degos, the last time when it was done, maybe they were supposed to have nine ass of reps members. Since then, more people have moved into Lagos. So therefore, if an enumeration is done, then they can delineate new constituencies and create more representation in certain areas, in other areas it may reduce. It has its own political usefulness. But within the context of Nigerian reality, we all know that there is a trend which has always led our sensors to be so controversial. The last acceptable sensors in Nigeria, which was not in any controversy, was the Nitro63 sensors. Since then, it has always been one manicudation after the other, one suspicion after the other. For instance, let me give you a good example. Nigeria is the only country in the world where there are more people in the bushes, you know, in the certified areas than in the coastal areas. It runs against the currency of thinking, currency of movement, migration, anywhere in the world. So how does this happen? It's not the physical thing. You only need to go and stay in bagger or stay in some water. You see how many trucks of people are moving into Degos on a daily basis. You know, carrying passengers and dropping people off and all that. And many of them are not going back. Whereas when you see that, but when you see the sensors, the figures you will have will be totally different. You know, so it's quite a very difficult situation, but we can surmount this problem by using technology and ensuring that, you know, everybody has NIN. Once you have NIN, you'll be captured on the system. They will need to integrate the whole system in a way that it will be easier for governments, including authorities like Nigerian Police for CFCC and others, to easily access information without violating people's privacy, but access information, particularly when crimes are committed. Let's talk about some other bits of politics. There may not be directly elections, but many have queried that this is the second time the census is being postponed in how many years. Now, they're saying that the results of this census, if it were to be conducted, and now it's not being conducted, might affect the all-sharing revenues. It might affect political representation amongst the 36 states of the Federation and the 300 ethnic groups, you know, across the country. What are your thoughts on this, especially the first bits, which is the sharing formula, especially for the all revenues? Mr. Showami, I'm just going to let you just, you know, give us your finishing thoughts before we go. So the bottom line is, no matter what we do currently, we need to be built trust in government. There will be a challenge for the people in the administration. We have to be clearly trust of our own people. We found ourselves in a situation where government initiatives are often thrown into a crisis of trust. And you cannot blame the people because they have seen so many examples of how the system, you know, became banalized, you know, by those people who are supposed to make it very interesting for them. A good example is the last currency swap, which created so many problems for people. So I think it's good for the federal government, the Guarese government to put money, allow the new government to settle down, gain the trust of the people before thinking about what they're trying to do, whether it is appropriate to go home with the current technology, combined with physical counting, or whether we need to really look at another means of conducting the sense of, that would be, that is the ideal thing. And I'm glad the government, you know, has chosen to live up for the new government. All right, I want to say thank you. Brother Showami is a political analyst and a veteran journalist. Thank you so much for speaking with us on this issue. And that's it on the show tonight. I want to say thank you to you all for watching. In case you want to play catch-up, just go to our YouTube page, Plus TV Africa, or Plus TV Africa Lifestyle. I am Mary Anacorn. Have a good evening. Happy May Day.