Paper short abstract:

Demographic and health statistics in Spanish Guinea have a two-way interaction with colonial power. Colonial control highly limits the production of statistics. But this, in itself, is also a means of control of the land and the people and an instrument during the decolonization process.

Paper long abstract:

Effective control of the Spanish possessions in the Gulf of Guinea only started in the mid 1800s. During the 19th century the administration is basically limited to the city of Santa Isabel, and early population statistic are produced together with actors like the missionaries or explorers. As control was gained over the territory there was a parallel expansion of statistical coverage. Since the 1930s the predominant causal direction would reverse. The introduction of professional statistics into Spanish Guinea due to the failure of the 1930 Census, and the revised 1932 professional census led to better knowledge and control of the island through institutions that developed such as the land registry (catastro). After the Spanish civil war a statistical department was created responsible for carrying out first biennial statistical compendiums and regular censuses. Health statistics provided a tool for control over the people through the introduction of sanitary passports for the control of tryponosomiasis. Analytical tests were carried out every three months in the island of Fernando Póo (Bioko) and annually in the continent, that were required in order for the passport to be stamped. Starting in the 1950s the decolonization process will highly influence the purpose and usefulness of demographic statistics. After an attempt at provincialization, a referendum for autonomy was carried out in 1963, and a professional statistician would be one of the few Spanish civil servants that remained after the independence of Equatorial Guinea in 1968 to assist in the confection of the electoral roll.