Parliament and the executive have disagreed on the national census. Government says it wants to conduct the census next year citing financial constraints.

However MPs have asked government to conduct the national census this year saying postponing it will cause a loss of billions spent on preparatory activities.

Kinkizi East MP Chris Baryomunsi said government and specifically ministry of finance officials don't seem to appreciate the importance of a national census. "Postponement will bring technical problems for demographers when doing their work," Baryomunsi said.

Tororo county MP Geoffrey Ekanya said census was necessary for planning for youth, women and children, planning and budgeting for districts. "How are we going to plan and budget accurately without accurate population statistics," Ekanya asked.

Aston Kajara state minister for finance told Parliament that the census would be pushed from August this year to August next year.

Kajara said the cost for the completion of the census was sh112.6b over three years starting from 2011. He said since 2011 there was a funding gap of sh27b and uncertainties for raising sh76b for 2012/13 and 8b for 2013/14.

He said since 2011/12 the total cost of expenditures amount to sh47.6b of which sh20.1b has been spent on activities such as census mapping, questionnaire development and conducting of a pilot census, which was done in August 2011.

In addition financial, Kajara said financial commitments in census procurements amounting to sh27.5b have been made and development partners have contributed a total of sh5.2b.