Last Updated on: 14th July 2023, 12:24 pm
Kampala I Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) has asked the government to allow it to postpone the 6th national population and housing census (NHPC) 2023.
As was initially planned, the census is to take place in August 2023 – running from 24 to 25. Because of procurement and other challenges, UBOS says the national exercise looks impossible.
Addressing a media conference this week [Thursday] in Kampala, Nabongo Godfrey, the Deputy Executive Director of UBOS stated that the planned exercise “may not be viable due to the ongoing procurement activities”.
Nabongo added that out of the US10m given by the World Bank for the census, they are already using part of the money for pre-census activities.
“UBOS is making a report to the Ministry of Finance and cabinet who set the date. So, we seek guidance,” the Standard’s deputy boss said, adding that their key priority is the procurement of computer tablets before August.
The Standard is satisfied that what they requested in the 2023/2024 budget saw no cut. “In terms of being enough, it is enough because the government did not reduce our budget.”
Currently, UBOS is working on ensuring that procurement is done before August as they await communication from the government when they can go ahead with the nationwide census.
Uganda last conducted a census in 2014 and the population was 36.34m people – World Economics.
Nine years later, the country’s population stands at 48.58m. The population of the East African country in 2021 was 45.85m – a 3.26 per cent increase from 2020.