Barely eight months after assumption of office, Nigeria’s Statistician General, Dr. Simon Harry, has died at the age of 57.
He was said to have died early hours of Wednesday, by the Management of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), which had nine days ago faulted and denied earlier reports on the death of Dr. Harry.
“The Board, management and staff of National Bureau of Statistics(NBS), with a deep sense of loss, announce the passing on of the Statistician General of the Federation and Chief Executive Officer of NBS, Dr. Simon Harry, in the early hours of today, Wednesday, April 13th 2022 after a brief illness”, said a statement Wednesday, by the NBS Director, Communication and Public Relations Department, Sunday Ichedi.
Dr Harry started his public career in the then Federal Office of Statistics in 1992 and rose through the ranks to become the Statistician General of the Federation on August 26th 2021.
Born on the 15th of March, 1965 in Lishin – Jengre of Plateau State, Dr Harry attended L.E.A. Primary School, Tuddai, Kaduna State (1974 – 1980); Amo Community Secondary School, Katako Jengre, Plateau State (1980 – 1985; from where he obtained his first school leaving certificate and the West African Examination Council (WAEC) certificates respectively.
The late Statistician General was admitted into the Ahmadu Bello University Zaria (1987 – 1990) and graduated with a Bachelor of Science (B.Sc) honours degree in Economics, after which he earned his Post-Graduate Diploma in Statistics from the University of Ibadan in 1997. Dr. Harry later attended the University of Abuja from 2014 – 2017 for his Master of Science (M.Sc) degree in Economics and also his Ph.D in Economics.
The late Statistician General was a member of many professional bodies in Nigeria and abroad. The deceased was happily married and his marriage is blessed with children.
On April 4, 2023 Ichedi in a rebuttal on the death of Dr. Harry said the NBS maintained that “there is no iota of truth in what was published by the online medium (Not Optimum Times) and considers the publication as the height of irresponsible journalism and a figment of the imagination of the publisher.”
According to Ichedi, “Now the fact of the matter is that the Statistician General was slightly indisposed on Saturday and following medication, is now recuperating.
“We are well certain that he would, in a matter of few days, be back to his desk and continue his work in repositioning the NBS as the foremost national statistics agency in Africa and among the best globally.
“We are all mortals and by nature sometimes get weary. That is the case of the Statistician General now and it is not unusual for anybody to get sometimes get (sic) weary in the course of daily endeavours.
“We are using this to advice the general public to completely discountenance the purported death of the Statistician General by a disreputable online medium, which has been noted for ‘irresponsible and fake news journalism’ since it deputed.
“While thanking those that have expressed concern about the health situation of the Statistician General in the past few hours following the ‘junk’ from the online medium, we are urging our other media to kindly disseminate the content of this press release as widely as possible in line with best industry practices.”
