The Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA) is about to commence with its last phase of the 2023 census, known as the Post Enumeration Survey (PES), expected to kick off on 6 to 17 November 2023.
“The idea is to go through randomly selected enumeration areas and establish whether the data collected during the enumeration phase, matches the data collected during the post-enumeration survey. PES will take place in all 14 regions, but only in selected constituencies,” said NSA’s statistician general Alex Shimuafeni.
Addressing a press conference recently in the capital, Shimuafeni stated the PES will see the NSA recruit 644 candidates. These candidates will be selected from the group of the applicants who applied for the census positions that closed in July 2023.
During the PES period, Shimuafeni noted vehicle transportation services will be as follows: In constituencies where there are reserves, the next vehicles in the list will be selected. In the constituencies where there are no reserves, vehicles that were registered in that constituency, but which were not inspected, hence they were not part of the initial selection, will be considered for inspection and deployment.
“In constituencies where there are no reserves, and the registration list is also exhausted, NSA will send out a new invitation exclusively to that constituency on a first come first served basis. The essence of this exercise is not to repeat those that were already considered but to give an opportunity to those that did not make it during the census,” explained the CEO.
Required vehicles for this exercise now comes down to only 284 countrywide as opposed to the 2 719 vehicles that were involved in the census enumeration.
Meanwhile, during the NSA team’s visitation to the President’s residence, the group briefed the head of State on the progress of the enumeration and issues they have encountered along the way.
“There were a few videos on social media showing resistances, we sent our a legal team to notify them about the Act where we have penalties like the N$50 000, five years in prison or both and they complied,” stated Shimuafeni.
The chairperson of the NSA Salomo Hei said Khomas, Omusati and Oshana already breached the 80% performance in terms of the response rate from household mapping process while places like Zambezi is at 78%.
“If you compare those numbers, it looks like they are outstripping the others. There are few lagging behind in Khomas, especially Windhoek East and it is probably because the majority of them work and when the enumerators come, they are at work,” stated Hei.
President Hage Geingob and First Lady Monica Geingos implored Namibians to cooperate with the enumerators and make sure they are counted.
“This is a national duty, as citizens of Namibia, we must know how many we are so that we can plan properly, provide schools, hospitals. The enumerators are doing their job, they are not there for jokes or to steal from you. Allow them in, just like I did,” said Geingob who can’t be counted because he did not spend the census reference night of 24 September in Namibia.