A Crowd of enthusiasts on Sunday night kept vigil in waiting to usher in Ghana's Population and Housing Census (PHC) reference point in Tamale, the Northern Regional capital.

The night was filled with sleepless activities as drummers, spinners and group shows were used to buy time to keep members of the public and enumeration officials awake to commence the exercise.

The Northern Regional Director of Ghana Statistical Service, Mr George Agbeyen, reiterated the importance of the census night and said it served as reference point for respondents to remember the exact date and point of reference. "It is also to ensure that we eliminate double counting and missing people out".

Mr Agbeyen indicated that as part of the exercise, enumerators would count travellers on transit at lorry parks, patients and other people at health facilities, and guests in hotels and guest houses.

He said the Northern Region has 596 Supervisors and from about 5000 field staff deployed to cover the region, adding "each enumerator is in an area, but where we have institutional populations like universities, hostels, because of the population, we assign one person to that institution"

He acknowledged that this census was different from previous ones, because, "this is the first time we are using digital or technology at this level for enumeration" and explained that enumerators used tablets, and data collected was sent to the head office where officials would analyse and send feedbacks immediately, for data with issues to be corrected. "As we are talking now the listing is over and the listing data is ready"

The Regional Director praised Census officials in the region, especially hired enumerators for showing commitment to the national excercise.

The Northern Regional Minister, Alhaji Shani Alhassan Shaibu, commended members of the public and media practitioners for their enthusiasm and commitment to the national exercise and appealed to members of the public to cooperate with census officials towards successful exercise.

Heads of Department, traders and people in academia, NGOs, Journalists, security agencies, drummers and host of other public interest groups were present to observe the vigil.