The Federal Government would recruit no fewer than one million Nigerians for the conduct of the 2023 census to be undertaken by the National Population Commission.
The Commissioner representing Ekiti at the NPC, Deji Ajayi, who made the disclosure, also assured that improved technology would be deployed to prevent politicians and interested elite from hijacking or manipulating the process.
Ajayi, who spoke in Ado Ekiti at a press conference heralding the trial census to be conducted in Ekiti as a preparatory exercise billed for next year, said, “Census is a massive operation that will engage one million personnel and managing such a huge workforce manually will raise huge logistical and documentation challenges.
“It is in recognition of this fact that the NPC resolved that recruitment for the 2023 census will be done electronically. This trial census will provide an opportunity to test the feasibility of the e-recruitment.”
He listed the nine towns across nine local governments selected and delineated into Enumerated Areas to ease the trial census as Ado, Emure, Iro, Ijero, Ikole, Iworoko, Ise, Ikun, and Omu Ekiti.
Ajayi said, “This is the first time we will be doing a paperless census, everything will be digital to check corruption and bring about accurate data that can help national development.
“The government will also use such statistics to plan for our youths, students, and the health needs of Nigerians. They will also know the number of gerontocrats, who should be catered for.”
Assuring that the exercise would be difficult to manipulate, the NPC boss said, “Technology is open to manipulation, but NPC has gone a step higher by having an updated technological innovation that can prevent multiple registrations.
“The biometric technology will capture your face and fingerprints and goes to the server and any similar information supplied will be noticed and expunged from the data immediately.”