At the risk of sounding deeply frustrated, I was compelled by some
circumstances beyond my immediate control to stay out of the fray that
characterized the closing week of the March 28th 2015 Presidential election.
Due to certain personal exigencies I had cause to run around for a Visa to
travel to South East Asian country of Malaysia to attend to some personal
issues that could not easily and seamlessly be confronted and sufficiently
tackled in the Nigerian health care system.
Few hours after the historic announcement of the official results
of the Presidential election which saw the emergence of the opposition
Presidential candidate of the All Progressive Congress General Muhammadu Buhari
as the winner defeating the incumbent President and candidate of the Peoples
Democratic Party Dr. Good luck Jonathan, I and my sibling jetted out to Malaysia
and so we have continued to observe and monitor reactions of diverse segments
of the Nigerian and global community to the legendary behavior of the eventual
loser of that Nigerian election and the incumbent President who for the love of
country acknowledged defeat and conceded victory to his arch rival. This is
salutary ad indeed the first ever concession by an incumbent President of
Nigeria.
First, it is so disappointing that some persons in the media lime
light such as the traditional ruler of the state of Lagos Oba Akiolu and the
erstwhile Chief of Army Staff ad the man who took part in virtually all of the
surreptitious military plots that toppled ad truncated civil and democratic
institutions up until the late 1970's General Theophilus Danjuma have
displayed total lack of public decorum by uttering hate speeches directed
against the members of the Igbo Ethnic group in the aftermath of the general
election simply because the majority of this tribal people known as the most
resilient republicans voted massively for the outgoing President who was the
candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party.
General Danjuma in his unbridled triumphalism that the Northern
born Presidential candidate defeated the Bayelsa Southern Nigerian born
Presidential flag bearer of the outgoing ruling national party stated that the
late leader of the defunct Biafran Army [General Emeka Ojukwu of blessed
memory] that fought unsuccessfully to achieve secession in the late 1960's in
protest over widespread genocidal killings of Igbos in Northern Nigeria, would
have in Danjuma's own warped thinking, saved Nigeria of one year of civil war
if he had conceded victory on time just like what the current President did
when he reportedly lost the March 28th 2015 Presidential election to the
Katsina born General Muhammadu Buhari.
On his own part, the Monarch of Lagos threatened to throw Igbos
living in Lagos inside the Lagos lagoon should they decide to vote for the
Governorship candidate of the PDP Mr. Jimi Agbaje against his [Monarch's] choice
candidate of the APC Mr. Ambode. This outrageously hateful threat has received
widespread condemnation and I do expect that the International Criminal Court
in The Hague, Netherlands will take special notice of this hate speech and
indict the Oba of Lagos for attempt to incite genocide in Lagos state during
the April 11th 2015 Governorship election against the Igbo Ethnic community
resident in Lagos.
Away from these hate speeches of these so called high profile
Nigerian elites, one major item of interest that profoundly inspires this piece
is the need to provide a clue to the incoming Federal administration on a
uniquely disturbing issue that it has to immediately go to work and fix before
more devastating harm is done to the Nigerian people. Aside national security
which must as a necessity be confronted as a top priority of the next
government of Nigeria from May 29th 2015 is the collapse of the Nigerian public
and private health system and schemes in Nigeria since the last half a
century.
Yours faithfully was forced by the lack of professional commitment
on the part of the health careers in Nigeria to seek for solace in foreign land.
Lot more Nigerians with means or with people who can assist them financially
are traveling in droves to all continents of the World to search for quality
health care because the services that they can receive back home in Nigeria can
at best be summed up as less -than- impressive and indeed life threatening.
Most health institutions especially in the public health system in Nigeria are
totally lacking in the basic facilities and the motivated workforce and health
professionals to tackle the variegated health challenges confronting millions
of Nigerians and due to these series of unprofessional conducts of these health
care workers most unfortunate Nigerians who can not afford to travel oversees
have died waiting for the quality health care services that are not available
in Nigeria. As I punch these keyboards in my hospital bed in Malaysia, I can
state without fear of contradiction that Nigeria has to work vigorously to fix
our collapsed health system. The incoming government must select some of the
most committed Nigerian health care administrators and professionals from
wherever they can be recruited from around the globe to move down to all nooks
and crannies in Nigeria to begin a year long state of health emergency in which
there has to be total overhaul of the workings of the health systems in both
the regional, sub regional and national levels. The issue of frequent
industrial actions by health workers must become anathema even as the
entitlements of health workers must be regularly serviced. Enough of these
cacophonies of industrial crises in the Nigerian health system. We must
humanize our health care services in Nigeria to save thousands of Nigerians
from avoidable deaths. This can and must be done now.
The Federal Government must in addition to carrying out surgical
and forensic audits of the accounts of the Nigerian defense and police sectors
to determine why national security has been endangered for so long, also embark
on a period of forensic audits of the budgets of the Nigerian health care
system to know where the 'rain' began to beat us, to retrieve all looted health
money and to begin a period of rebuilding, rehabilitation and total overhaul of
the health care facilities and the hiring of better motivated and well trained
health care professionals to man the newly revolutionized Nigerian healthcare
system.
The task of cleaning up the Augean stable and the dirty 'cobwebs'
in the public health system of Nigeria is a task that must be done if the well
being and welfare of the Nigerian people which is the primary duty of government
in accordance with the Nigerian constitution is to be observed to the full and
not in criminal breach as is the case currently. As a very serious
sector, the Nigerian health system must be completely clean up of all traces of
corruption and incompetence and the Nigerian ministry of health and the
ministry of Labour in active partnership with the ministry of public
environment must make sure that public and private hospital maintains the best
global practices in maintaining healthy environment to stop their patients from
been reinfected even whilst they are on admissions at the health facilities.
Right now as I write the dirtiest places in Nigeria are the public health
facilities and the so called General Hospitals. This show of shame must stop and
violators must be punished to stop the spread of diseases in Nigeria. Hospitals
should be refuge for health care delivery and not centers of spreading diseases
to the members of the public. We expect the incoming President to instill
national discipline so all health care providers are made to carry out their
duties to their patients in the most professional manner. The internal
mechanism for enforcing discipline of health care workers must be revived so
medical doctors take their jobs seriously and stop the ongoing mass murder by
neglect of thousands of patients.
The standard and quality of the public and private health
institutions must comply with global best practices and the poor citizens must
be provided with efficient health insurance to pay their hospital bills with
minimal discomfort. Hospitals in Malaysia are well equipped, very clean and
regularly maintained and the facilities are state of the art even as the high
quality of services offered by the health providers are second to none. Nigeria
has to enforce a code of maintenance culture so owners of health care
facilities are made to maintain best global practices. How else can the
incoming government stop the frequent outflow of Nigerians to foreign countries
for purposes of health tourism if the Federal and state governments will not
enforce a strict regime of maintenance culture and also provide the enforcement
regime to compel health workers to respect their professional code of conduct
and for the annoying frequent industrial actions to be bought to an end in the
health system? Few weeks into the Presidential campaign one of the hottest item
of public discuss was the trip embarked upon by the eventual winner of the
Presidential race General Muhammadu Buhari who was reportedly flown to the United
Kingdom for health check ups. Almost all public office holders in Nigeria and
their family members travel often abroad for health care. This is outrageous.
So it is imperative that the next government at the center in Nigeria must
prioritize the public and private health care services to save Nigeria's fast
depleting hard global currencies and/or foreign exchange. The President must
lead by example by not jetting abroad for health check up and this can only be
done if the Nigerian government would hit the ground running by declaring
national state of emergency in the Nigerian health system and fix back the
collapsed public and private health care. Elected state governors and their
officials must build better public health facilities ad patronize these local
health institutions whenever the need arises. State houses of Assembly must
make law to stop public officials from foreign health tourism at the cost of
public fund. Civil society ad community based organizations must build
capacity of their members to serve as checks and balances to monitor strict
enforcement of these sets of health care regimes in Nigeria. Charity they say
begins at home. Enabling environment must be set up in Nigeria to attract
foreign direct investors into the Nigerian health system. Let us make hay while
the sun shines and we must not let Nigeria be left behind by the rest of the
global human community.
*Emmanuel Onwubiko is Head of Human Rights Writers Association of
Nigeria and blogs @www.huriwa.blogspot.com, www.rightsassociationngr.com, www.huriwa.org.
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