Latest census results to be announced 10 October

Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) has confirmed it will announce Census 2022 results on 10 October. On that day statistician general Risenga Maluleke will hand over the census report to President Cyril Ramaphosa in Pretoria.

The report will provide comprehensive data on population size, demographic trends, and other service delivery-related information, said Maluleke following an inquiry to Stats SA by GroundUp.

The current statistics – from the 2011 Census – are more than a decade old.

Census 2022 was the fourth population and housing count in post-apartheid South Africa. The first was conducted in 1996, with subsequent censuses in 2001 and 2011.

Maluleke said StatsSA will follow “the trend adopted by many countries” by releasing its findings in phases.

Census project director Calvin Molongoana previously told GroundUp that the country was initially scheduled to be counted in October 2021, but the Covid pandemic “significantly compromised preparations”.

In December 2021, Mondli Gungubele, former minister in the presidency for planning, monitoring and evaluation, gazetted the census date for 2 February 2022.

Due to Covid, the latest census was conducted differently from previous ones. Molongoana said people are often sceptical of Census staff coming into their houses, for security reasons, and crime. Covid become an additional reason for the scepticism.

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As a result, Molongoana explained, Census 2022 was the country’s first digital census and people could participate through computer-assisted web or telephonic interviews. Most households, however, participated through in-person interviews with field workers. Nearly 100,000 fieldworkers were employed.

Since concluding the count, StatsSA has been working on the post-enumeration survey “to measure the accuracy of the census by independently surveying a sample of the population”, said Molongoana.

Published originally on Groundup | Marecia Damons