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Census:
Why it matters for Liberia
Saturday,
February 03, 2007
By
Wollor E. Topor
I
was privileged to have skimmed through the National
Human Development Report on Liberia (NHD 2006), first
of its kind. Some of the statistics were awful,
(particularly the annual population growth of 3.4%) on
socio-demography of Liberia.
An
immediate attempt to give credence to a number of figures was not easy to comprehend but held my feeling
from calling some bogus statistics.
Save for me, page 17 of NHD 2006 read, “A
major problem for Liberia has been the lack of
reliable knowledge base and data about the current
status of social, economic and human indicators in the
country.” While NHD 2006 has made considerable
headways, there are some issues that cropped up which
need to be addressed.
One
of such issues of concern in NHD 2006 is the ‘sense
of unified identified shared vision.’ Conventional
wisdom tells us that a nation without a vision is
consented to perish. A visionary strategy is a good
concept, which is not a ‘quick fix deal’ but a
main to long-term national development goals. It is a
step-by-step logical framework, which entails massive
participation of every Liberian in all levels as a
stakeholder of decision-making to share his or her
aspirations, views, opinions and interests on
development issues.
This
interventional strategy of visionary planning is to
learn from each other and do an in-depth analysis of
thematic issues to facilitate common consensus on
issues of similar domain for the planning of national
development.
It
is the radical redesigning of new strategy that go
beyond the short, medium-term and emergency plan. A
strategy that gives consideration to the unfinished
development issues (threats to life support components
like safe drinking water, affordable food all year
round, better shelter, improved health and sanitation,
access to functional education, etc.) of the 20th
century that barged in while we face with the
challenges of 21st century (contestable
concepts like improved life quality, sustainable
development, participation/democracy, etc.).
This
historic (first ever in Liberia) and holistic fashion
of visualizing long-term strategic planning, I am of
the view that there is no better technique to do this
than to hold a national census. There are incidental
advantages for census: a well done and genuine census
would send a clear signal that life is returning to
normal; this will enable assessment of
agriculture/food requirements and density of vehicle
usage, lifestyle and pollution factors, housing
conditions, etc.
In
general, census should help policy makers devise ways
to prevent the outbreak of diseases arising from poor
sanitation among others. Census should provide vital
benchmark database to measure and standardize the
transformation of Liberia.
Concerned
Liberians like Mr. James Harris including this author
wrote expressing our nervousness on the holding of
elections before the elections. This was our
constitutional right provided under Article 39, which
reads: “The Legislation shall cause a census of the
Republic to be undertaken every ten years.”
Our
point was that the demographic profile of Liberia has
changed considerably since the last completed census
of 1984, and two decades of civil war, which left
pinches of suffering on all Liberians during the last
14 years. Furthermore, common knowledge tells us that
hardly will there be a clear and legitimate voter
registration in any election where there has been no
census for three decades.
Unfortunately,
the National Elections Commission Boss and now
Minister of Justice, Frances Johnson Morris, along
with the international community reached the complex
consensus of “no census before election.” ‘Such
was time, so such was the condition.’
The
Liberian Legislature should be tackling the census
issue serous rather than wasting the taxpayers’
money in extrajudicial impeachment of Speaker Edwin
Melvin Snowe.
Wollor E. Topor
is an Agricultural and Rural Development expert,
freelance consultant on rural development, local
government and gender issues, and Board Member,
Liberian Environmental Watch (LEW). He lives in the Philippines.
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