Martin Endjala
The Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA) has revealed that out of the 13,000 tablets issued to enumerators during Census 2023 counting period, 30 were reported lost.
NSA spokesperson, Iipumbu Sakaria said this while responding to questions during a press engagement to unpack challenges the agency faced during the counting process.
He explained that before enumerators are issued with the tablets, they are signed off and a report is to be accompanied when it is returned, and based on the report is what will determine the cue of action to be taken against such an individual should it be found that negligence was the culprit, they would be held accountable.
“Out of 13 000 tablets issued to enumerators, only 30 were reported lost, which is a very low number, 0.01 percent is nothing, is a cost we can live with,” said Sakaria.
He further stated that the tablets have been designed in a way that even if stolen and sold, they have no other use except for Census purposes, thereby accentuating the security features the agency ensured to install in the tablets and trackers to track the movement of the enumerators to ensure that all roadmap locations have been covered.
He gave a recent case where an enumerator was reported to have been robbed and after filing a report the insurance company was able to cover the cost and no actions were taken against the individual.
However, one of the agreements was that if an employee lost or damaged the equipment, an amount would be deducted from their salary, but there has not been any sort of such incident reported.
Sakaria has also announced that a preliminary report of the 2023 Census will be out in the first half of 2024 while the main detailed report will be announced in the second half of 2024.
He explained that this is a lengthy process, which requires a lot of processes to be completed to ensure accuracy, and authenticity and to make sure that every last number is accounted for.
Sadly, he indicated that they encountered challenges such as people not wanting to be counted, denying access for enumerators, and overprotectiveness on certain questions that were too personal as well as remote areas where cars could not go and had to walk.
Among other issues was the payments of private vehicles used during the 2023 Census, but this was also solved, to date all vehicle services have been paid for including outstanding salaries for all 13,000 enumerators, although some of the delayed salaries were due to documents that were not completed.
