Maravi

(NEWZIMBABWE) Zimstat reopens census after miscount outcry

COMMENT - Isn't it just like the MDC to start calling election fraud over a mere population census? Find out how censuses are conducted before you start crying fraud. Not everybody is going to be at home. That doesn't mean you were defrauded.

Zimstat reopens census after miscount outcry
Mop-up exercise ... Zimstats deployed 30,000 census takers over a 15-day period
03/09/2012 00:00:00
by Staff Reporter

THE body running the 2012 census says it is redeploying enumerators for a so-called “mop-up count” after an outcry by people who say they were not counted.

Residents of several Bulawayo suburbs said Monday they were excluded from the 15-day population count which was carried out between August 12 and 27. Similar complaints have emerged from areas such as Harare and Masvingo.

MDC spokesman Nhlanhla Dube said: “These guys got to my house and told the maid that they would only accept the numbers of people who live in our house from either my wife or myself and since we were both at work, our family was not counted.
“So the Bulawayo numbers cannot be correct. I just wonder how many other people were not counted. Is this deliberate?”

Deputy Justice Minister Obert Gutu has already threatened to sue the Zimbabwe National Statistics Agency (ZimStat) claiming several of his constituents were not counted in what he described as a gross violation of their human rights.

“My household in Ward 8, Harare, was not enumerated. I have no explanation from ZimStat as yet; I am not happy about this,” Gutu fumed.

“I live in a small close in Ward 8. There are seven houses in our close, but none of the houses were enumerated. I feel that our constitutional right to be enumerated was grossly violated. I am mooting taking appropriate legal action against ZimStat.

“My family feels marginalised, discriminated and violated by not being enumerated in this otherwise very important national programme that takes place only once in every 10 years.”

Zimstat’s population census director Washington Mapeta said the agency would deploy enumerators for a mop-up count to address the problem.

"We are checking all those reports and for the purposes of making the whole process credible, enumerators will visit areas where people are said to have been left out,” he said.

"It is something we are looking at seriously because we know that there are single households where occupants might not have been there during the official days."
Finance Minister Tendai Biti recently described the census as a success adding results were expected by the end of the year.

Zimbabwe holds a census after every 10 years and the last count in 2002 put the country’s population at 11,6 million.

Labels: CENSUS, OBERT GUTU

posted by MrK @ 1:45 PM