Ons gaan die aantal mense na.

Because the verb is nagaan. This is a separable verb in Afrikaans.

In a normal main clause, the verb splits:

• the conjugated part goes near the beginning
• the particle goes to the end

So:

• nagaan → gaan ... na

That is why you get:

• Ons gaan die aantal mense na.

A good comparison is a split verb in German or a phrasal verb idea in English, though the grammar is not exactly the same.

No. Here gaan is part of the verb nagaan.

That is one of the biggest traps for English speakers, because gaan can also be used to form the future. But in this sentence, the final na shows that we are dealing with the separable verb nagaan, not the future construction.

Compare:

• Ons gaan die aantal mense na.
  = We check / verify the number of people.

• Ons gaan die aantal mense nagaan.
  = We are going to check / verify the number of people.

So the spelling and placement of na matter a lot.

Because die aantal means the number.

In Afrikaans, die is the definite article for:

• singular nouns
• plural nouns
• all genders

So die aantal mense means the number of people.

Afrikaans does not change the word for the the way some other languages do.

Because mense is part of the phrase aantal mense = number of people.

This works much like English:

• the number of people

You normally do not add another article before people, and Afrikaans works similarly here.

So:

• die aantal mense = the number of people

not:

• die aantal die mense

unless you were trying to say something quite different.

Yes. Mense is the plural of mens.

• mens = person / human being
• mense = people

This is an important vocabulary item because it is not formed with a simple -s ending.

Afrikaans main clauses usually put the finite verb in the second position.

With a separable verb, that means:

• the verb stem goes in second position
• the particle goes to the end

So the structure here is:

• Ons = subject
• gaan = finite verb part of nagaan
• die aantal mense = object
• na = particle

That gives:

• Ons gaan die aantal mense na.

Not in this sentence.

Here, na is not acting as a separate preposition. It belongs to the verb nagaan.

So you should learn nagaan as one dictionary verb, even though it can split apart in a sentence.

If na were a normal preposition, it would usually come directly before a noun phrase, not sit at the very end as it does here.

It often means:

• check
• verify
• review
• go through
• look into

In this sentence, the most natural idea is check or verify.

So the action is about confirming the number of people.

You would say:

• Ons gaan die aantal mense nagaan.

Here gaan is the future helper verb, and nagaan stays together at the end as an infinitive.

So compare carefully:

• Ons gaan die aantal mense na.
  present tense of nagaan

• Ons gaan die aantal mense nagaan.
  future construction: are going to check

That difference is very useful to notice early on.

Not normally. The natural expression is:

• die aantal mense

This is the standard way to say the number of people.

Afrikaans often uses noun combinations, but in this case aantal mense is the normal and idiomatic structure.