‘Anambra People Don’t Bother With Death Certificates Except Landed Property & Money Are Involved’

Raymond Ozoji, Awka

The National Population Commission (NPC) has decried what it sees as incessant claim of death certificates by bereaved families when such claims involve access to the bank accounts of deceased persons.

The commission also observed that people seldom come to obtain death certificates except if the deceased has some money in the bank and other landed property upon which they seek access to claim such valuables.

Disclosing this development to journalists at the commission’s office in Awka at the weekend, the State Director TPL Ulasi Okwuchukwu Joachin said the situation was worrisome in the sense that most people were only interested in acquiring deceased persons’ properties as evident in the unending crave to obtain death certificates for such purpose. He pointed out that family members of deceased persons don’t see the need to come to the commission to acquire death certificates when they perform funeral rites.

He stressed that such unwholesome practice hampered record keeping in the commission just as he pointed out that there was need for computerization of data on deaths as the commission still operated manual system of data storage on the commission’s activities in the state.

Another salient issue the Director raised was the shortage of birth registration centres in Anambra state. Ulasi noted that at the moment, NPC has only 124 registration centres  across the state and according to him, the centres were not enough to cover the 21 local government areas and the communities there-in.

He said the commission required more registrants for efficient coverage of birth registration in Anambra state as such data would aid the commission in its enumeration  while stressing the need for birth control and family planning in line with the 2018 United Nations World’s Population Day mantra tagged ‘Family Planning Is A Human Right‘. He added that the exercise of birth control as a right would result in responsible parenthood, improve maternal and newborn health as well as contribute to accelerated economic growth, prosperity and sustainable development in the country.