At a workshop organised by NPC tagged, ‘Comprehensive Assessment of Civil Registration and Vital Statistics in Nigeria,’ held in Ibadan on Monday, chairman of the commission, Eze Duruiheoma, said the partnership with the two international agencies would aid collation of accurate death and birth figures in the country, noting that societal beliefs and traditions were two of the major challenges facing NPC in the execution of its duty.
“At present, NPC has established and maintains 4000 registration centres throughout Nigeria. This gives an average of five registration centres per council area. Despite this, 58 per cent of the estimated five million children born in Nigeria annually remain unregistered. Some socio-cultural and religious impediments account for this unfortunate low level of response and registration.
“The primary aim of this work is to assess the stage of development of CRVS system, identify bottlenecks, challenges and the form of intervention required to arrive at complete registration. We have WHO and UNICEF as partners and with their experience and exposure, they have assured the commission of continued support for the CRVS system to be perfect in Nigeria,” said Duruiheoma, who was represented at the forum by the NPC Oyo State Director, Balogun Olajire.
Also in a paper presented by Odigie Oni, Director, Vital Registration Department of NPC, UNICEF was praised for aiding integration and institutionalisation of birth registration into healthcare delivery services after a Memorandum of Understanding signed in 25 states of Nigeria.
“In 2009, UNICEF supported Nigeria with computer training for 109 registrars in order to process the backlog of forms submitted to the commission. The World Bank is also helping the commission in direct capture planned to take off immediately to quicken data capture and facilitate better data management,” Oni said in the paper read on his behalf by Dr. Wakeel Baba Gana, Deputy Director, Vital Registration, NPC. (Source-PUNCH)
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