US embassy cable - 05SANAA873

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