BENSON CHIBUNNA ONYEKACHI
Governorship Candidate Abia State 2019 under KOWA party recently addressed a gathering of Ndigbo at a conference in London under the umbrella of Alaigbo Moving Forward Agenda. Igbere TV correspondents caught up with him after the event.
Excerpts of the interview below:
We understand you were not happy with the election results, Wasn’t it free and fair?
Truth be told, Nigeria is the poverty capital of the world. There may never be a free and fair election, we may never choose credible leaders, we may never attain true democracy as long as Poverty and corruption thrives. The question we should ask ourselves is this: Who and who make up the staffs in INEC? Are they not the same government inflicted poverty-stricken members of the public? Are they seraphs? Of course, they would accept bribes and their positions be compromised. INEC is not independent, has never been and may never be.
Same goes to the police. You give unpaid hungry men guns to protect the citizens? Of course, they will use the guns to their advantage. They will extort people to survive. These behaviours I do not endorse, but the Nigerian government has turned people into animals.
Nigerians are very intelligent people. That, you can deduce by how Nigerians flourish when they migrate to enabling environments. The people in government are very much Nigerians. I strongly believe they can turn this country around. They are just not willing. In the same vein I do believe Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu PHD can turn Abia around if he really wants to.
Why then did you contest to be chosen as governor if you knew it wasn’t going to be free and fair?
To offer my people a credible alternative. Na only one family dey Abia? Personally, to challenge the status quo. You find that most people just talk about bad leadership but won’t do anything about it. Its more civil to challenge our leaders democratically than say insurgency or terrorism. I must say that I have done well in inspiring people to stop being docile, the young ones especially.
What were your thoughts when Dr. Ikpeazu was announced the winner?
The election was marred by poor organisation, lack of transparency, significant evidence of fraud, vote buying, widespread procedural irregularities. I waited to see the reaction of the people. There was no protest of any sort, I concluded the people were satisfied with the results.
What would you say is the likely prognosis of Dr. Ikpeazu’s second tenure?
From the manner Dr. Ikpeazu danced on the news of his victory, I would infer that he may be desperate to correct all his wrongs and move Abia in the right direction. I hope he pulsl his finger out to redeem his image; A good name is better than silver and gold. If he works hard and leaves a legacy, he’ll be remembered forever. As it were, no leader has left a legacy in a very long while. He needs to prove himself and I think he may.
Tell us about the Alaigbo Moving Forward Agenda that was held in London recently during which you spoke about Healthcare in Alaigbo
It was held at Neasden College, Croydon. Organised by the CEO of the college who is an Industrious and philanthropic daughter of Abia state, Lady Nikky Emenike. There were a good number of great dignitaries in attendance, the Mayor of London borough of Enfield, Chief Mrs Kate Anolue, HRH Eze Douglas Okwara of Umunna Kingdom and a host of others. His Excellency Dr Victor Ikpeazu could not make it.
I spoke about the beauty of being Under-developed. That a lot of things that ought to be done that are not yet done create spaces for opportunities, entrepreneurship, partnerships, job creation and innovation. Then I went on to talk about the state of the healthcare system in Alaigbo and made some recommendation
Can you briefly share some of your findings and recommendations?
The Healthcare system is divided into Primary, Secondary and tertiary healthcare levels, with the Federal govt, state govt and Local government responsible for the policy development, overall stewardship, regulation and provision of healthcare at the tertiary, Secondary and Primary level.
However, what we find is that conditions that are supposed to be managed at the primary level are often managed at the tertiary level. This is because the primary level is weak, with inadequate infrastructure, funding, staffs and other deficiencies. For example, a Sickle Cell Disease patient ideally can be cost effectively managed in the primary healthcare centre by simply offering antibiotics and folic acid regularly to prevent crisis, but because the Primary healthcare Centres (PHCC) have no access to drugs and lack manpower, crisis are managed in hospitals. According to a retrospective study of Nigerian Sickle Cell Disease patients who died between 1991 and 2008 and had autopsy examination to confirm the cause of death in a teaching hospital, it was found that Infections are the commonest cause of death. You don’t believe it , do you?
My recommendation:
Primary healthcare is the base of any healthcare system in the world. They are at the heart of the communities. They are easily accessible and should be funded. Since 2012, the country’s health allocation has been at best 6% of the national budget, even though the African countries committed to an allocation of 15% in the Abuja Declaration 2001. A Premium times article noted that only 3.9% of the budget allocation was planned for 2018. The Local government level is the least funded. We understand that LG allocations will now be sent directly to LG accounts. We are hoping that this would mean that our PHCC will be more organised, equipped and staffed.
Numbers of facilities:
The last Federal Ministry of Health Census that was done, which took place in 2005, 14 yrs ago, gave an estimated total of 23640 health facilities of which 85% are primary healthcare facilities, 14% secondary and 0.2% tertiary. About 9000 health facilities belong to the private sector, which provides 70% of the healthcare services in the country.
A US Department of commerce, international trade administration report noted in 2014, there were approximately 3534 hospitals, 950 of them were public sector. At the time, Nigeria had an estimated 134,000 hospital beds, this is 0.8 per thousand populations.
Extrapolating this figures we may have 706 hospitals (211 being private) & 26000 beds in Alaigbo. This is poor considering we are 32Million people
Recommendation: Simply build more hospitals
Healthcare Human Resources
According to a US International Trade Administration’s report, the number of doctors in Nigeria was estimated at 66,555 in 2014. The Guardian 2018 report estimates the Nigerian doctors’ ration at 1 practitioner per 5000 population, which places Nigeria among the lowest in Africa. There is also a shortage of health workers and the density of nurses, midwives and doctors is estimated to be far too low to effectively deliver essential health services.
There is need of human resources for health (HRH) especially in the rural areas.
Recommendation.
Give Incentives for Healthcare Professionals to consider working in rural areas
Liaise with medical schools to run fast track courses for graduates of relative courses to go on to study to become doctors for example a four years intensive course for Biomedical Science students to become doctors
Or 2 years accelerated course for first degree holders in science to become nurses.
Patent medicine men have for decades gained the trust of the community. They are easily accessible and established. While they have acquired experience in dispensing medicines and advising on common ailments, they are lacking in training, knowledge and understanding about drug interactions and contraindications which can lead to mortality and morbidity. I propose that we can harness the relationship they have built within the community and train them to deliver efficient pharmaceutical services and within their area of competence. By training them, they are able to work safer, they are aware of their limitations and are able to decipher when to refer to higher personnel.
Mental Health
The number of suicide rates is increasing. Affective disorders remain highly stigmatised with many families hiding conditions and some blaming family member’s mental illness on witchcraft. This paucity of basic knowledge about mental health poses a major hurdle to improving mental health in Nigeria.
According to UK Medical Contacts in Nigeria (MEDCOI), the treatment of mental illness is possible in public hospital. There is no form of mental illness for which treatment is not available in Nigeria. However Human resources are not sufficient for the country’s needs.
There are less than 300 psychiatrists to Nigeria’s 190M people. Approximately 5 in Alaigbo.
Channels News reported in 2017 of contract awarded by the government to build mental health clinics in the geopolitical zones of the south east. That’s the last we heard about that.
Nigerian government formulated its first mental health policy in 1991 but never formally assessed its implementation. In 2003, the government introduced a Mental Health Bill but withdrew it 2009. The bill was re-introduced to the national Assembly in 2013 but is yet to be enacted
Recommendation: Train healthcare workers at the Primary health care centres to diagnose common mental illnesses. More importantly, the chronic widespread public stigmatisation of the mentally ill needs to be curbed. Literacy in mental health needs to be improved that is, School based educational programmes on mental health need to be instituted. Psychiatry rotation duration amongst clinical students should be increased (I understand it’s barely 4 weeks), this will help familiarise students with mental illness outside their pre-conceived misconceptions. We need to train more psychiatrists. The church and pastors are close to the community and are largely trusted by the people, their literacy and attitude towards mental health should be reviewed and trainings offered where gaps are found. Ultimately, the government needs to create enabling environment (infrastructures, jobs & employments, opportunities) so that ordinary Nigerians can flourish and the burden of personal and societal expectation to attain certain achievements in life will be lessened.
CANCER
Reported cases of people afflicted with cancer, young and old, in Nigeria is becoming alarmingly high, more so Alaigbo. According to the Nigeria national System of Cancer Registries 2016, After Lagos, Enugu recorded the 2nd highest cases of cancer with a total of 3282 in which 40% were male and 60% female. 3rd place was Edo then Anambra with total cases of 2024
For many cancer patients worldwide, radiotherapy cures, or helps to cure, their cancer. And for others it plays a crucial role in slowing the growth of tumours and improving the patient’s quality of life
However, The International Atomic Energy Agency Directory of Radiotherapy centres, ‘showed that there are only three functional radiotherapy machines in Nigeria’, only three!!
For a people of 32M, compared to the number of radiotherapy machines the UK for example has, if UK has 260 machines serving 55M people, Alaigbo should have 151 machines, however , we don’t want to be overzealous , at the least we should have 50. Each costing £2M, that will be £100M equating to N50B. That is money worth investing in Alaigbo. You may agree with me that some of these leaders pay themselves much more than this sum of monies.
Cervical cancer is preventable and we urge the government to do more in ensuring women are vaccinated against this time bomb. Private Individuals and NGOs are taking the bulls by the horns by leveraging on social media to create awareness. The government should look at investing in health awareness programmes surrounding cervical cancer.
There are factors that limit the access to healthcare for the patients suffering from cancer. Most people are poor, thus financial access to available health services is a challenge on its own. A study about breast cancer states that people tend to be poor, many presents to hospital late because they cannot afford cost of diagnosis, surgery and follow-up monitoring.
Accessibility is another explanatory factor virtually all the health facilities that can handle cancers are in the urban areas.
Recommendations:
I call on the attention of the governments in Alaigbo and research organisations to use the trend of cancer in Nigeria for setting priorities in cancer control programs.
There is need to develop regional screening program for major cancers within Alaigbo
There is need for regular survey
There is need to intensify effort on creating public awareness on the importance of lifestyle and dietary modification that will reduce cancer incidence.
I also spoke about Social & financial risk protection
By social protection we mean programmes and measures aimed at removing financial barriers preventing access to health care services and protecting poor and vulnerable populations from impoverishing effects of medical expenditures. Lack of social and financial risk protection leads to high levels of poverty, vulnerability & inequality in health.
Policy makers and political actors need to devise health care reforms to address the lack of social and financial protection for the poor and vulnerable. Part of this reform should be to expand the NHIS. States should be mandated to provide health insurance coverage to all residents
For the full speech, kindly contact on facebook: kachi benson or Instagram @benson_onyekachi
