Population is 38 600 000

BY BERNARD MOMANYI

NAIROBI, Kenya, Aug 31 – The population of Kenya has hit 38.6 million according to the much awaited results of the Population and Housing Census conducted in August last year.

This compares with about 30 million Kenyans in 1999, when the last census was carried out.

Download the full results here.

Planning Minister Wycliffe Oparanya has released the ethnic tally that places Kikuyu as the most populous tribe.

1. Kikuyu 6,622,576
2. Luhya 5,338,666
3. Kalenjin 4,967,328
4. Luo 4,044,440
5. Kamba 3,893,157
6. Kenyan Somali (nullified awaiting recount) 2,385,572
7. Kisii 2,205,669
8. Mijikenda 1,960,574
9. Meru 1,658,108
10. Turkana (also to be recounted) 988,592
11. Maasai 841,622
12. Teso 338,833

Mr Oparanya said the least populous tribes are:

Embu 324,092
Taita 273,519
Kuria 560,401
Samburu 237,179
Tharaka 175,905
Mbeere 168,155
Borana 161,399
Suba 139,271
Swahili 110,614
Gabra 89,519
Orma 66,275
Rendille 60,437The country’s total population has now hit 38, 610, 097 with the number of men and women standing at 19 million each.

The results released on Tuesday by Planning Minister Wycliffe Oparanya showed that there were 19, 192, 458 men in Kenya against a population of 19,417, 639 women dispelling previous assertions the ratio was 1 to 3.

The Minister said the census conducted on the night of August 24 and 25 denoted an increase of 10 million people from the previous survey carried out in 1999 when there were 28.7 million people.

“Currently, Kenya is adding one million people yearly to its already high population,” the Minister said and added: “This high rate of population growth has adverse effects on spending in infrastructure, health, education, environment, water and other social and economic sectors.”

He said the trend of the population increase called for an immediate increase in education investments by the government to meet the demands of the growing school age population and the demand for future manpower.

In addition, he said, critical investment would be required in family planning services, health and other social and economic sectors to improve the welfare of Kenyans.

Results for some eight districts in North Eastern and Turkana were however, cancelled due to inconsistencies.

They include Lagdera, Wajir East, Mandera Central, Mandera East and Mandera West, all of which are in North Eastern Province which borders the lawless Somalia.

Other districts affected include Turkana Central, Turkana North and Turkana South near the Kakuma refugee camp.

The Minister said an investigation had been launched to establish circumstances that led to the inconsistencies reported in the districts.

“We expect the ratio of female male to be about 50:50 in some areas, but we were surprised the ratio was three times. There were more men than women, almost three times than women. So we thought something was wrong,” the Minister said.

He said the anomaly was discovered when statisticians analysed the ages of people in those areas to establish the difference between the results of 2009 and in 1999.

"We analysed ages of people and realised that the men were three times than the female, and you know those communities are polygamous, so we discovered that there was a serious problem,” he said.

The Minister revealed that an investigation had been launched to establish the real cause of the anomaly to establish if people from another country had filled the gap or if enumerators had interfered with results from those areas.

“That is what we think but I have engaged the Provincial Administration and we are really going to investigate up to the household level, and if we find that someone was involved in falsifying the figures action will be taken,” he warned.

In the census results released on Tuesday, Rift Valley Province was the most densely populated with 10 million people followed by Eastern Province with 5.6 million people and Nyanza Province which has 5.4 people.

Central and Western Provinces have 4.3 million people each while Coast has 3.3 million people.

Nairobi Province has 3.1 million people while North Eastern Province has 2.3 million people.

Census per tribe

The results show that members of the Kikuyu community are the majority in the country at 6.6 million people followed by the Luhya community which has 5.3 million people.

There are 4.9 million members of the Kalenjin community, 4 million Luos, 3.8 million Kambas and 2.3 million Kenyan-Somalis.

Kisii’s are 2.2 million, Mijikenda 1.9 million, Meru 1.6 million while Turkanas are 988, 592.

Maasai’s are 841, 622 while Teso’s are 338, 833.