(AP) — A weeklong census ended Monday in Nigeria as workers scrambled to tally everyone across Africa’s most-populous nation, but many remained uncounted in the exercise plagued by missing forms, missing census takers and missing money.
“Reports from the states indicate near-completion of enumeration,” Samui’la Makama, head of the census commission told reporters. But he said some of Nigeria’s estimated 120 million-plus people hadn’t yet been reached, saying enumerators would work in the dark and make all efforts to finish the tally by midnight.
President Olusegun Obasanjo had extended the first count in 15 years by two days Saturday after complaints that many had not been counted due to violence or poor organization.
Previous censuses in Nigeria’s 36 states were marred by manipulation. Population plays a role in deciding how political power is allocated and a national treasury filled with oil revenues is shared.
In one example of the problems faced this year, about 15 villages inhabited by more than 45,000 herders in the northeastern Yobe state had not been counted by Monday because they were not included in the official census map, said Musa Usman, senior census official in the region.
Makama said a security agent foiled one official’s attempt to sell forms for use in falsifying figures in central Benue state.
In many parts of the country, the census was hit by shortages of materials and workers who disappeared after receiving allowances of 5,400 naira (about $40) for completing training.
It was unclear when preliminary results might be published.
At least 15 people died in violence related to the census. Police said they clashed with separatists in the southeast opposed to the count while two communities in the southwest fought a deadly clash in a land dispute sparked by the census.