THE NORTH FEIGNS CENSUS READINESS; CLAIMS DAFURIANS WILL

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KHARTOUM 000172 SIPDIS DEPT FOR AF/SPG, S/CRS, AF/SE WILLIAMSON ADDIS ABABA FOR USAU DEPT PLS PASS USAID FOR AFR/SUDAN SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV PREL KPKO KDEM SOCI AU UNSC SU SUBJECT: THE NORTH FEIGNS CENSUS READINESS; CLAIMS DAFURIANS WILL PARTICIPATE FULLY REF: (A) KHARTOUM 155 (B) KHARTOUM 114 (C) 07 KHARTOUM 1229 ¶1. (U) SUMMARY: Under the authority of new Director Yassin El-Hag Abdeen, the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) claims that the North is completely prepared for the April census. The director, an NCP member with no professional background in the field, rejects any suggestion that there are census mapping gaps in Darfur. He claims that Dafurians, even IDPs, will participate in census enumeration without skepticism or fear. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (U) On 31 January, poloff met with newly-appointed CBS Director Dr. Yassin El-Hag Abdeen. Abdeen was formerly the Director of Faisal Islamic Bank, Sudan Airways, and the National Electricity Corporation of Sudan and worked at the Center for Future Studies, a Sudanese government-supported think tank in Khartoum. He was chosen by the Presidency just two weeks ago to replace former CBS Director Dr. Awad Hag-Ali. This shift in general leadership in the North comes just three and a half months before the national census is to occur. ¶3. (U) Early in the meeting, former Director Awad walked in, greeted poloff, and joined in the discussions. Poloff questioned Awad and Abdeen as to why the switch in leadership was made and both claimed not to know. Abdeen confessed that he was happy working at the Center for Future Studies and seemed confused by his appointment to the CBS. He theorized that the Presidency wanted him to "transform the CBS" into a policy planning institution. He said his appointment was not only about getting the census done right, but about making sure the CBS performs on the whole for years to come. He expressed his frustration of working with civil servants, something he has not had to do in the past. Former Director Awad, who was in a rather jovial mood, explained that he has returned to El-Nilein University full-time as Vice Chancellor. He has made himself available to CBS Director Abdeen for several weeks in order to bring him up-to-speed. -------------- UNCONVINCING DECLARATIONS -------------- ¶4. (U) Dr. Abdeen assured poloff that by mid-February, all technical preparations for the census in the North will be in place. When poloff asked about the worrisome issue of the lack of a presidential decree to declare the April census date official, Abdeen claimed "this will be done in one or two days." He added, "The decree is ready; it can be issued by the Presidency over the phone." He assured that "everything is in place" and that the CBS is awaiting the official date in order to begin census advocacy campaigns over the radio and the TV. Abdeen said that the advocacy campaigns will be heavily targeted to rural communities. ¶5. (SBU) Poloff asked Abdeen what the North is going to do about the 20 percent of Darfur (corresponding to over 2 million people in IDP camps and rebel-controlled areas) that per UNFPA cannot be mapped due to security concerns and lack of access by government enumerators (ref A). Abdeen strongly denied that the unmapped areas are equal to 20 percent or over 2 million people. He said that there are only "a few pockets" of Darfur that are unmapped and that only the rebels live in these areas. All IDP camps, he claimed, had been successfully mapped (although he could not explain how this was accomplished). Rather unconvincingly, Abdeen predicted that there will not be any problems with the census in Darfur and that Darfurians (even IDPs) will participate. "This is the fifth census in Sudan and the culture is not skeptical of such things." He continued, "It is not the case that people will be unwilling to participate." -------------- LACK OF CONFIDENCE AMONG CENSUS STAFF -------------- ¶6. (SBU) Abdeen called in one of his staff to provide poloff with the exact numbers on Darfur mapping. According to the CBS statistician, two out of 14 localities in North Darfur are not mapped; however, he claimed that these two localities have no residents. In West Darfur, two of eleven localities are unmapped because they are inaccessible (rebel-controlled areas). The staffer had no information on the mapping status of South Darfur State. The meeting took an interesting turn when the staffer made a personal plea to Director Abdeen to hire more CBS staff and increase working hours so that the digital enumeration area (EA) maps can be completed by 1 March. The statistician explained that two of the CBS staff responsible for map printing had recently resigned and that the current staffing is inadequate. Abdeen, clearly annoyed by his subordinate's complaints in front of poloff, told his staffer to hire as many people as is necessary to get the job done and quickly KHARTOUM 00000172 002 OF 002 shooed the staffer away. -------------- REMAINING CONCERNS -------------- ¶7. (U) Abdeen confirmed rumors that the CBS is still advocating for five data processing centers in the North. The South has agreed to have only one, located in Rumbek (ref B). When asked by poloff about the status of census preparation in the South, Abdeen said that he thought the South would be ready and that the Southern Sudan Commission for Census, Statistics, and Evaluation (SSCCSE) had made good progress over the last two weeks (refs B and C). ¶8. (SBU) COMMENT: This meeting seems to confirm three of our suspicions: (a) the North is not as on track as it claims to be in terms of census preparation, (b) the North denies there will be any problem with holding a census in Darfur, and (c) the new CBS director is totally unprepared for his new role. Throughout the meeting, Director Abdeen pulled back the Wizard of Oz-like curtain behind him to call in staff to answer critical questions about census preparation that he did not have the answers to. His strategy backfired when one of his staffers used the opportunity as a platform to convey his lack of confidence in the CBS's preparation and inability to meet critical deadlines. It is apparent that the CBS is having internal staffing problems and that new Director Abdeen is not yet aware of what is going on is his own organization, much less with census preparation in the North. The latest roadblock is the lack of a presidential decree making official the April census date. We hope that Abdeen's prediction that the decree will be promulgated in one or two days is true, but Abdeen's overtly optimistic prediction that it would be issued within days did not fill us with confidence. FERNANDEZ