Media Should Check Fake News for Success of Census, Says Varsity Don

Laleye Dipo in Minna

The Head of Department of Mass Communication, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University, Lapai, Niger State, Professor Tenedes Ende, has charged media practitioners in the country to be in the vanguard of checking the circulation of fake news for the success of the National Population and Housing Census.

Ende gave the charge in Minna on Tuesday while delivering a paper titled: “The Population or Housing? Decoding the Matrix for Effective Reportage of the 2023 Population and Housing Census,” at a one-day “Capacity Building Workshop for Journalists on Effective Reporting of the 2023 Population and Housing Census.”

He charged journalists to be ambassadors of credible information during and after the census, adding that “we should combat fake news by not sharing fake news. 

“We should join hands with the NPC to make the 2023 census successful and acceptable,” adding that the press has very important role to play before during and after the head count.

The Head of the Technical Department of the Commission, Mr. Sanusi Yussuf, disclosed at the forum that every arrangements have been completed to ensure the conduct of the census in “physical and security hard to reach areas of the country,” adding that “demarcation of security prone areas has already taken place.”

Yussuf who disclosed that no fewer than 27,000 ad hoc staff would be recruited for the exercise apart from the staff of the commission.

He pointed out that everything has been put in place to ensure that the exercise is as transparent as possible and meet international standard practice.

Part of the arrangement, he said, included the setting up of a “census situation room” in Abuja and other states of the federation from where “on the spot monitoring of the exercise will take place.”

The State Director of the NPC, Mr. Nma Shehu, said that the organisation had carried out the training of ad hoc staff, set up a state situation room and recruited “the remaining categories of the census functionaries as well as the training of enumerators.”

The Federal Commissioner for Niger State, Mr. Mohammed Dattijo Usman, assured that the NPC would conduct a free, transparent and acceptable census but called for support and cooperation from the public.

Usman, who was represented by his Special Adviser, Mr. Nda Ali, also solicited the support of other stakeholders for the programme to succeed.