A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, yesterday, ordered the National Population Commission (NPC) to release details of spending on the aborted 2023 Population Census to an Abuja-based lawyer, Opatola Victor, within seven days.
Justice Inyang Edem Ekwo issued the order while delivering judgment in a suit instituted against the population commission.
The judge declared that the refusal by the NPC to release the information or records of spending on the aborted census as requested by the lawyer on March 30, 2023 was wrongful, illegal and unconstitutional.
Justice Ekwo, who invoked Section 4 of the Freedom of Information Act (FOI) in the judgment, held that the refusal of the commission to provide the plaintiff with information on the companies that provided due diligence report on the technology to be deployed for the ill-fated census was a gross violation of the right of the plaintiff as enshrined in Section 4 of the FOI Act.
The court, however, refused to grant N500,000 in favour of the plaintiff as he requested in the suit.
In the judgment, the judge granted an order of mandamus compelling the NPC, its servants, agents, privies and officials to furnish the lawyer with comprehensive and detailed information concerning the Quality Test Assurance Report on the devices and technology to be deployed for the postponed 2023 population census.
Justice Ekwo rejected the claim by the defendant that bureaucracy and the absence of its executive chairman at the time was responsible for the refusal to make the requested records available to the plaintiff, adding that the claim was untenable.
The judge also dismissed the claim by the NPC that some of the requested information were classified, which prompted the refusal to make the records available to the plaintiff, adding that from the definition of classified information, there was nothing secret on the issue of population census.
