By Musa Na Annabi Sokoto 

The National Population Commission (NPC),Sokoto State office says it will adopt “Geo-fence methods” to conduct enumirations in  proposed  locations in the state. 

The  Federal Commissioner Representing Sokoto State at the Commission, Alhaji Chuso Abdullahi Dattijo stated this during a  press briefing held at Nigeria Union of Journalists ( NUJ),Secretary along Zulu Road, Sokoto on Thursday. 

Dattijo said  under the new method   the commission  employs indigenes of the community as enumirators  to conduct the trial census especially in the security  hard to reach areas  of the state. 

He noted that the problem of insecurity prevailing in many states of the federation cannot be overemphasized as such it can causes serious risk to the commencement of the trial census in some parts of the state. 

He recalled that with the helping hands of security agencies in the State,  the commission successfully navigate the challenges during the inauguration of some areas in the 1st and 2nd pre tests exercise .

The commissioner hope that,   the same  gesture cooperation  would  be extended to the commission  by the  security agencies at the  trial census. 

 He said the NPC has selected 7,718 enumeration areas for the trial of census to test run suitability and readiness for the actual census scheduled for the year 2023.

The trial census field work is scheduled to commence between the July 11th to 30th this year in some selected areas nationwide. 

He  stated that the selection of the coverage areas has been scientifically and purposively carried out to achieve the objectives of the trial census. 

He further stated that the selection of samples from all states of the federation and FCT is expected to yield nationwide information on state–specific issues that may arise for the next census and come up with possible solutions for addressing the challenges. 

The commissioner  maintain that the trial census is not the actual enumeration of persons for the 2023 population and housing census. 

“The outcome of the trial census will form the basis of the 2023 census and data generated during the trial census will not be used to arrive at figures for the 2023 census, which is going to be zero–based and from information collected in April 2023”,said the NPC commissioner.