The National Orientation Agency (NOA) in collaboration with the National Population Commission (NPC) on Friday flagged off community sensitisation and births registration in Nasarawa State.
Mrs Priscilla Gondoaluor, State Director of NOA in Nasarawa State, while flagging off the sensitisation in Nassarawa Eggon Local Government Area, said the exercise would cover 36 communities in six local government areas of the state.
She pointed out that low childbirth registration impacts negatively on the development, growth and welfare of all Nigerians.
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Gondoaluor said that the campaign is done in collaboration with the NPC is supported by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
According to her, the campaign became imperative as available records show that about 50 per cent of births in communities in Nasarawa State are not registered.
The NOA state director said that the situation affected the welfare of the children in terms of the provision of social amenities and other services since the government could not ascertain the accurate population figure.
“We are aware that in some of our communities when women give birth at home they tend to forget to take their children for the registration in the hospitals.
“So, we set out with the support from UNICEF to sensitise the people of Nasarawa Eggon Local Government on the need to get their children registered when they are born. We will also take the sensitisation to five other Local Government Areas,” she said.
Gondoaluor said the agency was engaging with stakeholders including, women leaders of Associations, traditional rulers and religious leaders to step down the message to their subjects in communities.
She said that officers from NPC would be on the ground for four days in each of the communities to register children aged from zero to five years.
“We are expecting a work plan to be put in place to entrench this programme so that people can see child registration as a responsibility,” she added.
On his part, Mr Umar Tafida, state Director of NPC, said the commission was expected to do mop-up registration of 14,450 children from zero to five years during the exercise across six local government areas.
Tafida listed the local government areas to include Nassarawa Eggon, Keana, Awe, Wamba, Kokona and Keffi.
He explained that childbirth registration is usually used by the government for population projection in between censuses. (NAN)
