The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) will soon commence publishing (un)employment statistics two years after it stopped, the Statistician-General of the Federation, Yemi Kale, has said.

Mr Kale said the bureau was faced with insufficient funding but has received funds from the federal government "to continue the survey."

"But this was slowed down by the (coronavirus) pandemic induced lockdown," he told PREMIUM TIMES.

"NBS did not stop publishing labour force statistics. We had challenges with funding like most other MDAS. We have now received the funds but the lockdown slowed down the work. However, it has now commenced and will be published once the work is done up to q2 2020," he said.

The labour force statistics which reveal the unemployment rate in the country was last published in the third quarter of 2018, meaning there has not been any official release of the national unemployment rate for the past six quarters (Q4 2018 to Q1 2020).

In the last report, Nigeria's unemployment rate increased from 18.8 per cent in the third quarter of 2017 to 23.1 per cent in the third quarter of 2018.

The total number of people classified as unemployed, which means they did nothing at all or worked too few hours (under 20 hours a week) to be classified as employed, increased from 17.6 million in Q4 2017 to 20.9 million in Q3 2018.

Controversy

After the bureau could not publish the report for the last quarter of 2018, there were speculations that the statistics were purposely withheld because of the 2019 elections.

Opponents argued that the report was being delayed until after the election, so as not to harm President Buhari's chances at re-election.

In his defense, Mr Kale had said in a tweet "U guys need to stop this. I know it's election time but I've said this repeatedly. Nobody is calling me to manipulate any data or not to release any data. The work can't be completed due to budgetary releases. It's not hard to confirm when last we got data funding and how much."

However, some Nigerians accused President Buhari of undermining Mr Kale's NBS by starving it of funds.

"If Buhari is starving NBS of funds needed to publish unemployment data, Yemi Kale should resign," a twitter user tweeted.

Also, Ben Murray-Bruce, who was then a senator under the Peoples Democratic Party, kicked.

"The @MBuhari government should provide @sgyemikale, a @OfficialPDPNigappointee, with the funds to do his job even if the report exposes that this government has a poor unemployment record. Yemi Kale wont be treated like this in an @atiku administration"

Recently the bureau published the "Poverty and Inequality in Nigeria" after a decade.

According to the report, 40.1 per cent of the total population in Nigeria was classified as poor, which implies that an average of four out of 10 adult individuals in Nigeria had real per capita expenditures below N137,430 per annum.

Globally, unemployment rates have since increased due to the lockdown on economic activities as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic currently ravaging the world.

In the United States, one of the largest economies, about 20.5 million jobs were lost in April alone.

Source: https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/headlines/400505-why-weve-not-published-nigerias-unemployment-figures-for-two-years-nbs.html

2 reasons

Its either u dont have the correct statistics




Or





The figures are way over de roof.

Both are very very bad

Everyone knows that the unemployment rate in Nigeria is higher than the IQ of some of our top government officials

It will be shameful to post it...

The stat go too wash bubu, unfortunately!

After the bureau could not publish the report for the last quarter of 2018, there were speculations that the statistics were purposely withheld because of the 2019 elections.

That what I believe happened but Atiku's campaign didnt capitalize on the issue so it worked out well. Fact is no matter what the rate is now covid will be the convenient excuse. It doesn't matter if the general trend was rising unemployment before.

stop lying u haven't because if you do,you will be attacked by apc

NBS is being headed by mediocre

Its political, they don't want to embarrass the government of the day. Even among employed Nigerians, a high percentage are not satisfied in the jobs they do, cos they either earn peanuts or are in slave jobs. Unemployment in Nigeria is a pandemic, such that If you gather all unemployed individuals in Nigeria, you will create another very populated country

So no budgetary provision for a strategic MDA like NBS? Nothing new because the government you're subserving is founded on lies & propaganda.Lying is the hallmark & lies are richly engrained in their DNA.

Nigeria needs to improve on their database

Yemi Kale the fraudulent statitician, we know the figures are too high that you'll find it difficult to cook them so you can downplay the serious of the unemployment epidemic.

Unlike the regional poverty rate stats which you manipulated for 'political expediency' unemployment data pass your power. You no go fit rig am.

Afonjaa organisation doing mago mago and releasing falsified figures

Shame catch shame e shout ... Shame shame shame .... Shame.

Also note they haven't published crime stats in years aswell. They dont seem to publish stats most people would be interested in. Their priorities are best known to them.

Just look at this barefaced liar !!!! You were instructed by the govt not to release it it because of the elections and now you want to release it and put all the blame for the huge unemployment caused by Buharis bad leadership on COVID ....Yemi Kale has already gone down as the worst Stat General in Nigerias history so far

Another Year will pass and nobody will ask where is unemployment and crime states during this election season. If opposition Candiate were intelligent they would attack this issue but they're pretty dull.