MOSCOW: Russia has declared the country’s first post-Soviet census a success, but analysts say the preliminary results indicate the country’s continued population decline, while numerous refusals to be counted are seen as yet another form of social protest.

Although the final results of the census will not be available until the end of March 2003, some preliminary figures have been released. The latest figures from Russia’s State Statistics Committee has put the population at about 143.5 million, down from nearly 150 million a decade ago.

The continuing population plunge in Russia is explained by a falling birth rate, effects of alcoholism, and a deteriorating health-care system. According to the official estimates, unless the situation changes, the Russian population will drop to 80 million by 2050.

The preliminary results also indicate that a steady stream of Russians are moving back to the European part of the country from remote regions of Siberia and the Far East. Hence, the expansionist trend of the past several centuries is being reversed, leaving hardly populated stretches in the Asian part of the country.

However, Russian officials try to sound upbeat. Russia’s population “took an active part in the census despite our fears,” says the State Statistics Committee, or Goskomstat, head Vladimir Sokolin. He claims that 93 per cent of the country’s population participated in the census.

However, Russian media reported entire apartment buildings, even whole villages, that refused to be counted. According to the reports, many Russians simply refused to open their doors over security concerns or did not believe the promises made by Goskomstat, the state agency running the census, that the information would remain confidential.

Apparently people in some regions boycotted the census to protest low living standards, hence eyeing the same purpose as voting for “none of the above” during the elections.

Therefore, the census’ official slogan “Write Yourself Into Russian History!” seemingly failed to convince many people. In Moscow alone, where almost 90 per cent of the estimated 10 million residents have been counted, 600,000 people had declined to participate, census officials conceded.

Moscow city census officials have said that data on those who could not be reached by census-takers or who refused to participate would be gleaned from records kept by city district housing maintenance offices which keeps lists of officially registered residents that include gender and age.

Those not taking part in the census were be counted anyway, says Irina Zbarskaya, head of the Statistics Committee’s demography and census department. She dismissed media allegations that the results of the census were rigged. Zbarskaya called for new legislation to be passed before the next census for anyone who ignored the head count to face fines.

Russian officials have yet to explain what the point of the census was if the people could have been counted from existing official records. Moreover, the country has a history of forging census results.

Notably, the 1937 census which revealed that the Soviet population plunged by some eight million people because of the forced land reform, political reprisals and executions. However, Soviet dictator, Josef Stalin, did not like the census results and ordered the organizers arrested and executed. Two years later, the country conducted another census, the shortfall was corrected, and the Soviet population was inflated to a better level.

Russia’s latest census showed that the population of war-torn Chechnya had experienced an unprecedented expansion. Preliminary returns from the census showed that Chechnya’s population stood at about 1.088 million or roughly 300,000 higher than 1999 estimates. Even Russia’s minister on Chechen affairs Vladimir Yelagin conceded that 1.088 million figure was “unrealistic,” and suggested that the actual figure was 850,000. He conceded that there were incidents of deliberate inflation of the population size in Chechnya in order to embezzle benefits and pensions. Following this statement, Yelagin was fired earlier in November and no official reason for his departure was revealed.

Of the 11 questions on the census form, the most controversial ones concern a resident’s source of income and occupation. The occupation question even puzzled President Vladimir Putin for a moment when a census-taker interviewed him on television. After a pause, Putin said he worked in “public service.”

The census early results showed considerable numbers of “temporary unemployed.” Russia’s de-industrialization and its growing dependency on exports of natural resources has caused a situation in which millions of people find themselves overqualified for most income-generating activities, argues Dmitri Glinsky, researcher at the Moscow-based Institute of World Economy and International Relations.—Dawn/The InterPress News Service.