2004 CENSUS RESULTS: FIVE MILLION MISSING YEMENIS?

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 SANAA 000873

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/22/2015
TAGS: PREL PGOV ECON EAID ELAB SOCI KWMN KMPI KMCA KDEM YM DOMESTIC POLITICS ECON COM
SUBJECT: 2004 CENSUS RESULTS: FIVE MILLION MISSING YEMENIS?

REF: SANAA 589

Classified By: CDA Nabeel Khoury for reasons 1.4 b and d.


1. (C) Summary and Comment. On March 16, the Yemen Central
Statistics Organization (CSO) surprised the donor community
in Sanaa, along with many ROYG officials, by announcing a
2004 Census result of 19.7 million Yemenis, an apparent drop
from an estimated 22 million. Earlier that day, two senior
ROYG officials confided to Ambassador that they expected the
new census would reveal a current population of 25 million.
The discrepancy of 5.3 million between official estimates and
the new official figure has been met so far with widespread
skepticism. ROYG underreporting of population figures, if
true, may reflect an attempt to artificially improve economic
indicators such as per capita GDP; this would run counter,
however, to what has been considered traditional over
reporting in order to garner greater donor aid. Others claim
the ROYG is underreporting population figures in opposition
Islah strongholds in order to influence redistricting plans
in advance of September 2006 local council and presidential
elections. Among these many claims of wrongdoing, none alone
are likely to account for a miscounting in the millions.
Post recommends caution, however, in coming to any
conclusions based on the preliminary figures until the final
results are out and further study of both methods and motives
is conducted. End Summary and Comment.


2. (U) Background: ROYG official estimates just prior to the
new Census pointed to a population of 21.7 million. The
round figure of 22 million has used by the ROYG and the
international community based on the 1994 Census of 14.6
million and an estimated annual growth rate of 3.5 percent.
The new December 2004 Yemen Census was funded in part by a 1
million USD grant from USAID. The preliminary results
announced on March 16 cover only a few key indicators such as
population growth rate and size. According to CSO Chairman
Amin al-Din, the complete 2004 Census figures will be
released in four months. End Background.


3. (C) Just hours before the March 16 announcement, two high
ranking ROYG Ministry of Planning and International
Cooperation (MOPIC) officials, Jalal Yaqoub and Nabil
Shaiban, projected to Ambassador a new population figure of
25 million. When the official 2004 Census results were
released later that day, however, the ROYG gave the number of
19.7 million. The CSO also claimed a decrease in the growth
rate from 3.7 in 1994 to 3.02 in 2004. CSO Director al-Din,
told USAID Director several days after the Census, release
that he had resisted pressure from President Saleh himself to
inflate the figures. (Comment: This may be bravado as it is
hard to believe any ROYG official would disobey a direct
request from the President. End Comment.)

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WHERE ARE THE 5.3 MILLION HIDING, AND WHY?
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4. (C) In explaining lower than expected 2004 Census results,
many observers point to inaccuracies in the 1994 Census data.
That Census was taken just after a civil war and amidst
internal instability that could have contributed to a less
than accurate count. Other insiders insist that the ROYG has
traditionally over estimated its population's size for the
purpose of eliciting increased international development aid
contributions, holding that the current 19.7 figure is likely
a more realistic number.


5. (C) There are also credible claims of underreporting of
district populations where the opposition Islah has a
stronghold, as well as of underreporting of women and
children. International Federation for Election System
(IFES) officials in Sanaa suspect there was underreporting in
the 2004 Census. They hold that the GPC tried and succeeded
in gerrymandering to increase its seats in Parliament by
redistricting areas of opposition strength before the last
elections in 2003. Deputy Foreign Minister Noman also
suspects politics influenced some of the new figures, calling
the reported increase in the population of GPC dominated Taiz
from 2.4 to 3.6 million "not plausible."


6. (C) Majid al-Fahd, of the Civil Democratic Forum (CDF),
also believes that the Census results are biased in order to
skew future election redistricting in favor of the ruling
GPC. The CSO conducted the survey not through random
selection by employing 30,000 officials tasked with visiting
every household in Yemen. According to Fahd, CDF was the
only organization systematically monitoring the census and
found that of 6900 households it polled throughout the
country, 21 percent reported never being visited by a census
representative. Noman joked that he discovered in a Qat
session attended by 15 others, he was the only one in the
room who had been visited by a census taker. Fahd also
charged CSO officials with neglecting to visit every
household, suggesting they relied on tribal sheikhs for a
count of residents in their region. Many of these same men
serve on local councils or are members of Parliament, leading
Fahd to believe the number of 19.7 is not too low, but
possibly too high, as a result of these Sheikhs' attempts to
inflate their constituencies.


7. (C) Comment: The controversy on actual, as opposed to
politically motivated figures, will likely persist partially
due to the novelty of reliance on objective statistics in
Yemen. This controversy, we hope, will only spur local and
international organizations to conduct more research that
should eventually lend to more reliable figures. End Comment.
Khoury