- The agency should be properly funded to function effectively
THE failure of the Federal Government to adequately fund the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has been condemned by the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. On his part, the statistician-general, Mr Yemi Kale, reportedly claimed that lack of funds is hampering the ability of NBS to perform one of its statutory functions; that of providing the annual unemployment figure. Without doubt, data is fundamental to efficient planning. If so, why is the NBS not properly funded?
According to the PDP’s candidate, the Federal Government led by President Muhammadu Buhari, is dodging the responsibility of funding NBS so as to impede its capacity to garner data, to show the high level of unemployment in the country. While there are no independent facts to back such a claim of bad faith in the funding of NBS as made by Abubakar, there is no doubt that NBS needs to be properly funded in other to meet its primary function of aiding proper planning, based on facts. No doubt, talk is cheap in a campaign season, and nobody should blame the opposition for lampooning the ruling party for any real or perceived failure.
To drive home the point, the former vice president, who in 2011 contested as the candidate of the Action Congress (AC), and in 2015, was a presidential aspirant on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC), claimed that while in power for 16 years, the PDP adequately funded the NBS. In his words: “throughout the 16 years that the Peoples Democratic Party governed this nation, their various governments never took this route, but funded the NBS to perform its statutory duty.”
Regardless of the political grandstanding of the PDP’s candidate, and the failure of the APC-led government to answer the charges, there is no doubt that successive governments in the country have not given data the pride of place it deserves. To compound the absence of credible data on the unemployed, the country operates without a credible census, and if finger pointing is the way, the APC-led government, can as well, say that PDP in the 16 years it was in power, failed to conduct a credible census, as required by law.
Without a census, how can a country plan a credible election, without knowing who is a citizen and who is not? Again, how can there be proper town planning, development of physical and social infrastructure, when the planner does not know the number to plan for? Interestingly, Abubakar who is raising the red flag, was a vice president for eight years under the PDP, substantially in charge of the national economy. Regrettably, there is no evidence that he made use of data while in charge for that long.
All the country relies on is guess work, yet we have the NBS, intellectually equipped to answer our needs on data. Even the National Population Commission has since the era of Festus Odimegwu been planning for a national census. Why our officials prefer not to generate credible data for national planning, baffles. Unfortunately, like in the established tradition of the PDP, the APC-led Federal Government has been quiet on the issue of census, preferring to rely on estimates, when the real figures can be generated.
Now that Abubakar has made the use of data a campaign issue, we hope the Federal Government will wake up to the challenge of funding the NBS. Planning without a credible data is like looking for a black sheep in the night, without light. We urge the Federal Government to fund the NBS adequately in the country’s interest.
