BRATISLAVA, April 5, (WEBNOVINY) — Two weeks before the beginning of the national census, the Statistics Office and the Interior Ministry are exchanging sharp words over flaws in its preparation. Head of the statistical authority Ludmila Benkovicova stated on Thursday that unprofessional information and dramatic statements pose a threat to the census, and, moreover, disparage work of thousands of the office’s employees. She warned that this situation may result in people ignoring the census. “I did not intend to wage a war or an argument for competencies,” said Benkovicova warning that the problem is a direct threat to the census.
The head of the Statistics Office reacted to Interior Minister Daniel Lipsic who stated on Wednesday that the Statistics Office did not handle well the preparation of the population census that will take place later this month. “We warned the Statistics Office already last year that its preparation for the census is unsatisfactory, that the census districts have been created in an odd way, that there is no methodology and that the groundwork is wrong and outdated,” he told journalists, adding that the office did not take his advice into account. However, he believes that the municipalities will do all they can to make sure that the census results are as precise as possible; it will not be to the credit of the Statistics Office, but rather the hard work of the municipalities. According to Lipsic, it is important that the census is carried out, but high-ranking officials will have to take responsibility for the botched preparation.
Benkovicova sees the problem in insufficient revision of urban units, which she blames on the Interior Ministry, which refused to provide results of the revision of borders of municipal units to the authority. Moreover, though it is the ministry’s duty, the Statistics Office had to secure identifiers necessary for the census. “Nobody will carry out the census better than the Statistics Office,” said Benkovicova.
Benkovicova suspects that the argument plays in somebody’s hands. The census districts were to be set based on a revision of basic urban units. The Environment Ministry was to carry out the revision based on an agreement with the Statistics Office but the Interior Ministry ordered district offices to stop the revision. In December, the Ministry came up with its own project, however according to Benkovicova it did not secure harmonization of outputs. Benkovicova does not believe that the ministry’s own project would be able to secure the results. Moreover, at that time the Statistics Office had a contract with IBM for already eight months, which covered all stages of the census. IBM also created an application for the Statistics Office based on maps provided by the Office of Geodezy, Cartography and Cadaster. The problem was that the ministry refused to provide outcomes of the revision of borders of districts of municipalities. The conflict was formally resolved in January and Benkovicova says that they lost time for preparation while some data inaccuracies emerged, which have made the work of the Statistics Office even tougher.
SITA