Skopje, 14 September 2021 (MIA) – A total of 512, 457 citizens, 158,519 households and 212,464 apartments were counted in North Macedonia until 8 pm on Monday, proving people’s awareness and responsibility for collecting data crucial for creating a common future. The government expects the census to resume at the desired speed and all activities to wrap up successfully by September 30, government spokesperson Dushko Arsovski told a press briefing on Tuesday. State Statistical Office director Apostol Simovski underlined at the new conference that the census is underway at the desired speed, without any issues or delays. “On Monday, we counted a total of 93,235 people, 29,491 households and 40,155 apartments. We’re happy with the speed of activities and the work of census takers and hope they remain unchanged and the process wraps up within the deadline, without any issues,” Simovski said. Minor technical difficulties, he added, were encountered at the start of the operation, but they have been overcome and the census has been taking place for the past three days without any issues, at a satisfactory speed. “I don’t expect any other issues, but if they do appear, we’re backed by an entire team, ready to intervene at any moment. The operation is expected to wrap up completely by the end of the month,” Simovski noted. A very small amount of people have refused to be counted, the SSO head said, and their exact number will be known today. “We go and talk to those who have initially refused to participate. Most often, we manage to convince them to get counted. No sanctions have been implemented yet and hopefully none will be enforced by the end of the process and we manage to convince everyone that propaganda against the census is based entirely on misinformation,” Simovski told reporters. Personal identification number and documents are crucial for a person to be counted. If a household member is not present when census takers visit, they schedule a time to return and count them.