By Ene Oshaba
Abuja
The executive chairman of the National Population Commission (NPC), Hon. Nasir Isa-Kwarra, has launched the e-recruitment portal for the successful conduct of the April 2023 Population and Housing Census.
Hon. Isa-Kwarra during the inauguration ceremony which held Monday October 31, 2022 in Abuja at the commission’s headquarters, saying that the bulk of personnel for the 2023 census will be drawn from the communities where they are resident.
“This will remove the huge logistics of moving personnel across the country. Consequently, every community will have the opportunity of contributing to the census workforce thereby ensuring that the people are adequately counted,” he said.
He maintained that “the gigantic task of conducting accurate and reliable census, requires the recruitment of manpower that will carry out the exercise”.
He said the commission’s commitment to fairness and transparency in the recruitment process led to the introduction of the online e-recruitment portal, adding that this aims to train the officers that will superintend over the census recruitment process.
“I am happy to inform Nigerians that the Commission will through the online recruitment process request for applicants from the following categories of field staff that will be needed to prosecute the next Census: Facilitators, Training Centre Administrators, Monitoring and Evaluations Officers, Data Quality Managers, Data Quality Assistants, Supervisors, Enumerators.
“The number of functionaries to be recruited in each category will depend on the number of available vacancies in each State, which will be derived largely from the total number of Enumeration Areas (EA) in the States,” he said.
“The launching of the online e-recruitment portal for the 2023 census at the headquarters marks the beginning of the online recruitment process whereby Nigerians from all demography and gender can hook on to the website that will be provided by the Commission to fill the online form and get themselves registered to be recruited.
“Let me use this opportunity to assure Nigerians that the bulk of personnel for the 2023 Census will be drawn from the communities where they are resident. This will remove the huge logistics of moving personnel across the country.
“Consequently, every community will have the opportunity of contributing to the census workforce thereby ensuring that the people are adequately counted.
“I want to use this occasion to promise Nigerians that the Commission is on course and will continue to be fair and transparent as we approach the 2023 Population and Housing Census,” he assured.
Earlier in his goodwill message, the Director General (DG) National Orientation Agency (NOA) Dr. Garba Abari, noted that Nigeria is a big country with huge population and for everyone to be counted requires large human resources, assuring of the agencies support to ensuring a credible 2023 census.
He stressed the need for experiences in capacity to be deployed, called on Nigerians to avail themselves for the exercise just as he assured that Nigeria is safe for both the 2023 general election and the population and Housing census.
“Nigeria is safe, we would have election, we would have census and Nigeria will remain peace, ” he assured.
Also in his goodwill message, the Postmaster General, Hon. Sunday Adeyemi Adepoju, noted that proper preparation prevents poor performance, expressing confidence on the NPC to conduct a credible election xome 2023.
According to Adepoju, the population exercise is as important as the existence of the nation and without a proper census the nation cannot move forward, stressing that the census data is key to planning for both educational, health, and many other needs of the citizenry.
“This can be achieved by having the right caliber of people that will go to all parts of the country. With this e-recruitment strategy of the Commission Nigeria will have a credible data and the postal service is ready and committed to support the exercise because the next government will plan the nation well based on the data from the population census exercise,” he said.
Earlier, the Director, Employment and Wages at the Ministry of Labour and Productivity, Gloria Ndifon, said e-recruitment is the new development and digital is what rules the world, and while commending the Commission for giving youths job digitally she said it will enable them gain experience and have better bargaining power for future engagements.
Also, the representative of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Chief Mrs. Ann Aderibigbe, lauded the e-recruitment portal saying this serves as a challenge to other agencies to embrace digitization to enable accuracy, saying the NPC is on the right track.
Giving an overview of the e-recruitment portal, the Census Manager, Inuwa B. K Jalingo, said the e-recruitment aims to recruit staff who will work in all areas in the six geo-political zones, and from all communities to enable adequate coverage of every cutizen, disclosing that the exercise will require over 25 million Nigerians to apply as adhoc staff.
Meanwhile, the Director Public Affairs Department at the NPC, Dr. Isiaka Yahaya, explained that the exercise is not just recruitment but a key preparatory activity to the 2023 census, adding that it is a stakeholders’ engagements activity which will enable a National census with accurate data for national planning.
Highpoint of the event was the decoration of key stakeholders from the NOA, NIPOST, INEC, NIMC, NYSC Federal Ministry of Labour and Productivity, and NBS as Ambassadors of the 2023 census to join the league of Governors and President Muhammadu Buhari who had also been decorated as Ambassadors.
