It's Now Official - We Are 24m

Ghana's population now stands at 24,233,431, according to provisional figures of the 2010 Population and Housing Census released in Accra.

The current national population represents a 28.1 per cent increase over the 2000 population figure of 18,912,079 and means that the country’s population has been growing at an annual rate of 2.4 per cent since 2000.

According to the figures, there are more females than males, with the population of males standing at 11,801,661, while that of females is pegged at 12,421,770, representing 48.7 per cent and 51.3 per cent, respectively, of the total population.

With respect to the regional distribution, the Ashanti Region has the highest population of 4,725,046, up from the 2000 population figure of 3,612,950, followed by the Greater Accra Region, with a population of 3,909,764, up from the 2000 population figure of 2,905,726, while the Upper West Region has the lowest population of 677,763, as against the 2000 population of 576,583.

The Government Statistician, Dr Grace Bediako, releasing the figures at a news conference Accra yesterday, emphasised that they were just provisional and that the final results of the census, giving full details of all the various demographic characteristics, would be released in March 2012.

She noted that the growth rate of 28.1 per cent since the last census in 2000 was high enough to warrant concern.

Prior to the beginning of proceedings at the event, the Conference Room of the Ministry of Information had been filled with anxiety, as some journalists recalled the disappointment they had been served with last Monday.

A news conference scheduled by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) on that occasion to announce the provisional results had been called off at the 11th hour because of what its officials described as “technical reasons”.

Within that atmosphere, an opening prayer by the Head of the Publicity and Education Unit of the GSS, Mr David Kombat, thanking God for forgiving us even when we wronged Him, drew some giggles from the audience.

When the Minister of Information, Mr John Tia Akologu, and the Government Statistician took the stage later, they could not have rendered enough apologies to journalists and all Ghanaians for last Monday’s disappointment as they kept pleading for forgiveness in their speeches.

“I think in the struggle of every institution we make great strides and we fall into ditches and pick ourselves up,” Dr Bediako remarked.

Mr Akologu, who is also the Chairman of the National Census Publicity and Education Committee (NCPEC), lauded officials of the GSS, saying that in spite of the challenges they faced, they were able to pull through the census successfully.

On the speculations and spins put on the last-minute cancellation of last Monday’s programme, he said the government would respond to them at the appropriate time, adding, “For now, we will treat them with the contempt they deserve.”