Census enumerator ‘assaulted’ in Kimironko

ANOTHER census enumerator was assaulted in Kimironko, a Kigali suburb, the National Institute of Statistics of Rwanda (NISR) has said. The incident is the latest of isolated assaults that have been reported since the national housing and population census commenced.Yusuf Murangwa, the Director General of NISR, yesterday confirmed that the exercise was facing some challenges.Police said they have made arrests without giving the number of suspects and the names of the assaulted individual. Earlier last week, census clerks were also reported to have been assaulted in Huye and Kamonyi districts by members of Abagorozi, an outlawed religious sect famous for opposing national programmes and policies. Murangwa said: “We have really taken enough time to explain and sensitise the public about this exercise. Now, we shall let the law take its course. However small such incidents are, we take it serious even though it does not threaten the whole exercise”.“We have 25,000 people on the ground, and when one person encounters such a problem, it is an isolated incident that does not hurt the exercise very much,” he assured. “Indeed, there have been few incidents, where people, were unfriendly but police and other authorities intervened swiftly”.He said the census would be concluded two days before the earlier set deadline of August 30, stressing that the exercise “is on the right track” and will be concluded in 13 days instead of 15 as earlier planned.”He says the two extra days will allow them time to streamline and sort out some issues where they may be.“One big challenge is that the exercise is very huge and, in such situations, some unexpected things will come up from different places, but that should not be a surprise. We have realised that in some places, things like logistics can lag for a short time, say two or three hours, but this is really not catastrophic,” he said.He cited communication in some remote places as another challenge, where there is no telephone network. “The good thing is that in 95 percent of the country, the communication is good. In terms of logistics, sometimes, we go to a place and find that there are more people than we had expected,” Murangwa added, noting that they are “handling” the situation.Apart from logistics and poor telephone networks, few seemingly isolated incidents of people harassing NISR’s enumerators, have weighted down on the exercise. Importance of the censusOnce complete, sometime in 2014, final and accurate census data will give a comprehensive picture of the social and living conditions of people in the country. It will provide complete details, right down to the smallest area, and the results are an essential tool for effective policy, planning and decision making purposes.It will provide critical facts enabling public resources to be shared evenly across the country, and it will ensure that services at local level are relevant to all people living there.Census figures will provide across a range of different criteria – age, education, employment, language spoken, religion, health, and so on.Such information is used to tell about the composition of the population and to identify the needs and requirements of people in planning for service provision.The current national population and housing census – the fourth following others in 1978, 1991 and 2002 will cost Rwf16.5 billion.