Samuel Ortom, the governor of Benue State, has requested that the federal government postpone the proposed National Population Census, which is slated to take place in May 2023.
When Ortom met a delegation from the Middle Belt Forum led by its president, Dr. Bitrus Pogu, in Makurdi, the state capital, on Wednesday, he made the call.
The Governor asked the FG to halt the exercise until the Internally Displaced Persons, or IDPs, returned to their homes after alleging that there may be a hidden agenda behind the conduct of the census.
He said, “The FG should suspend the issue of the census because it looks like the proposed census is coming with an agenda.
“So until they are able to restore security and all our IDPs return to their ancestral homes to give all of them opportunities to be counted in their homes of birth.
“Because I understand from the National Population Commission that those to be counted must be counted in their localities”.
The state has the worst record of herdsmen attack in the country, with thousands of persons killed within a year.
Benue has over two million persons living in different IDPs camps across the state.
Barely one week ago, the dreaded killer herdsmen invaded one of the IDPs’ camps and killed at least 35 persons.