SUDAN: Census on course as more returnees head home
JUBA, 10 March 2008 (IRIN) - Preparations for the national census are moving ahead, with the mapping of enumeration areas in Southern Sudan completed and the UN starting to deliver materials by air to various states, a senior UN official said.
After being postponed several times, Sudan's fifth census is scheduled to take place from 15 to 30 April. Analysts say the exercise is key to the 2009 elections.
"Material is being transported to the 10 states of Southern Sudan in readiness for census night of 14 April," David Gressly, regional coordinator of the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) for Southern Sudan and UN Deputy Resident Coordinator in Sudan, said.
UNMIS flew the first batch of census materials to Malakal, Upper Nile State, on 5 March. Subsequent flights were planned to leave Juba, capital of Southern Sudan, for Rumbek in Lakes State, and Wau in Western Bahr El Ghazal State. Other flights would follow to the remaining states and capitals.
"The Southern Sudan Commission for the Census and Statistical Evaluation has trained 40 principal trainers, who will instruct enumeration supervisors in state capitals," UNMIS said in a statement. "The UN Population Fund is working to bring staff from census offices in neighbouring countries to assist with additional training in Sudan."
However, funding was a problem, according to a senior government official, who urged Southern Sudanese authorities to provide the South Sudan Census Commission with enough money to conduct the census.
The commission chairman, Issaia Chol, told UN Radio Miraya on 9 March that the government had not yet provided the US$7 million needed for the exercise.
Preparations for Sudan's census have been dogged by controversy over questions of religion and ethnicity. It is expected to ask interviewees if they are from the North or South or another country and about religion, but Southern leaders have demanded that it also detail language or ethnicity.
Returnees to participate
Gressly was optimistic that returnees to Southern Sudan would be able to participate in the census.
Between the signing of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended decades of war in Southern Sudan and the end of 2007, an estimated two million Southern Sudanese have returned to the region and the transitional areas.
The UN estimates the total number of IDPs or refugees from the South at about 4.4 million and has a target to repatriate 438,000 this year. Another 250,000 are expected to return spontaneously.
"The returnees [will] now be able to participate in the forthcoming national population and housing census and the 2009 general elections," Gressly told reporters at a monthly briefing in Juba.
Some 68,000 IDPs, he said, had returned from the Northern capital, Khartoum, to the South, along with 80,000 refugees from Uganda, Kenya and Ethiopia. UNMIS had organised the return of 157,217 Southerners.
Since January, the UN and International Organization for Migration have assisted 5,060 IDPs while the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, has resettled 2,500 refugees. "Most of them returned to their respective home villages in the 10 states of Southern Sudan," Gressly added.
pj/eo/mw
Theme(s): (IRIN) Governance, (IRIN) Refugees/IDPs
[ENDS]
Copyright © IRIN 2008
This material comes to you via IRIN, the humanitarian news and analysis service of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations or its Member States.
IRIN is a project of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
