MURIC Warns FG Against Fixing National Census For Ramadan Period

Muslim Rights Concern (MURIC) has warned the federal government against the conduct of national census during the month of Ramadan.

MURIC’s director, Professor Ishaq Akintola, said on Wednesday that the date was fixed for the 2023 census by the National Census Commission. 29th March to 2nd April 2023 might not be good dates for the exercise because those dates fell within the first and second weeks of Ramadan.

The chairman of the National Population Commission, Nasir Isa Kwarra, had announced March 29 to April 2nd as the dates for the 2023 census.

According to MURIC, this has not gone down well with the Muslims.

While noting that nothing in Islam says working during the month of Ramadan was prohibited and millions of Muslims did their daily works during the month of Ramadan, it said the rigorous spiritual exercise in Ramadan cannot be easily combined with the hazards of census for both the citizens who were to be counted and the enumerators too.

The group explained that experience had shown that the ad hoc workers of the census exercise are usually taken into villages.

“The work consumes time and energy. It entails training of enumerators, supervisors and other facilitators on how to fill forms for households and field work.’’