The vice-presidential flagbearer of the Nigeria Democratic Congress, NDC, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, has implored the Federal Government to organize a brand-new national Population and Housing Census, pointing out that the country has gone two decades without conducting the exercise.
Kwankwaso put forward the demand in an official communication shared on his personal X account on July 11, 2026, in commemoration of this year’s World Population Day.
According to Kwankwaso, Nigeria has persistently depended on demographic data from the 2006 headcount for vital national strategy, spanning schooling, healthcare delivery, security management, infrastructural development, job creation, and budgetary distribution.
He noted that the deficiency of modernized demographic statistics has hindered efficient master planning and balanced progress throughout the federation.
“The previous exercise, conducted in 2006, has left us dependent on obsolete demographic figures for vital national choices concerning schooling, healthcare delivery, security management, infrastructural development, job creation, and budgetary distribution.”
Kwankwaso asserted that precise and contemporary population data remain indispensable for state governance, internal security, durable development, and comprehensive advancement.
“On this World Population Day, I earnestly exhort the Federal Government to focus on and orchestrate a dependable, open, and technologically sophisticated national Population and Housing Census without any further postponement. The period for offering excuses has passed. The moment to take action is now.”
