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Nigeria The Census Controversy
Because seats in the House of Representatives were
apportioned on the basis of population, the
constitutionally
mandated decennial census had important political
implications
(see Population
, ch. 2;
The First Republic
, ch. 4). The
Northern
Region's political strength, marshaled by the NPC, had
arisen in
large measure from the results of the 1952-53 census,
which had
identified 54 percent of the country's population in that
area. A
national campaign early in 1962 addressed the significance
of the
forthcoming census. Politicians stressed the connection
between
the census and parliamentary representation on the one
hand, and
the amount of financial support for regional development
on the
other. The 1962 census was taken by head count, but there
was
evidence that many enumerators obtained their figures from
heads
of families, and many persons managed to be counted more
than
once.
Southern hopes for a favorable reapportionment of
legislative
seats were buoyed by preliminary results, which gave the
south a
clear majority. A supplementary count was immediately
taken in
the Northern Region that turned up an additional 9 million
persons reportedly missed in the first count. Charges of
falsification were voiced on all sides and led to an
agreement
among federal and regional governments to nullify the
count and
to conduct a new census.
The second nationwide census reported a population of
60.5
million, which census officials considered impossibly
high. A
scaled-down figure of 55.6 million, including 29.8 million
in the
Northern Region, finally was submitted and adopted by the
federal
government, leaving legislative apportionment virtually
unchanged.
Demographers generally rejected the results of the 1963
census as inflated, arguing that the actual figure was as
much as
10 million lower. Controversy over the census remained a
lively
political issue. NCNC leaders publicly charged the
Northern
Region's government with fraud, a claim that was denied by
Balewa
and by Bello, the regional prime minister.
Data as of June 1991
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