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HEALTH INTERACTIVE WITH DR AMINU MAGASHI Jigawa, My Dream State It
was not really out of love for the people of Benue, Ebonyi, Ekiti
And Jigawa states that the Department For International Development (DFID)
of the British Government selected the four focal states for a long term
project implementation aimed at addressing peculiar health, legal and
social needs of the populace in those states. The said programmes,
Partnership For Transforming Health Systems (PATHS) that seeks to
achieve sustainable benefits for the poor by addressing basic health
needs such as malaria, diarrhea, sexually transmitted infections,
tuberculosis, and immunisable child hood diseases. Also Access to
Justice Project, which is also aimed to support security and justice
sector towards improved condition between members of the criminal
sector, penal reform, improved policy and security for communities and
improved access to justice. Another project ' State And Local
Governments Program which works to strengthen the capacity of the 4
states and their respective LGAs towards responsive government, improved
human resources management, efficient and pro poor resources, allocation
and service delivery. Looking
at these 3 long term projects by DFID, in my own personal opinion as to
the rationale of selecting the 4 focal states, the answer could not be
far fetched, in the geo-. political zones of the 4 states, compared to
the other states in the same zones, the 4 states are quite regrettably
the poorest, least developed and bedeviled with squalor, poverty,
diseases and ignorance, hence, in my own understanding the commitment of
DFID to assist those states to catch up with sister states. My
bringing DFID programme in to this discourse is just for the sake of
giving an example of the involvement of international donor agencies and
civil societies in Nigeria towards health reform and development.
Looking at the 4 states, Jigawa case is the worst, the state is being
continuously hit by a lot of factors that hinders rapid development and
growth and for it to come out of that doldrums, a concerted effort
by all and sundry from within and without need to be done through short
and long term projects. First
and fore most, since the creation of the state in 1991 by Babangida
Administration, 13 years precisely, one will be amazed and aghast as to
the sluggish nature of development in the capital of the state (dutse)
and other areas, apart from few infra structures and few business out
fits, there is nothing to see or write home about. Looking at some
indices of development, it is tearful to note that the maternal
morbidity and mortality is on the high toll attributed to pregnancy and
its complications (vesico- vaginal- fistula, anemia, malaria, eclampsia,
obstructed labour and bleeding), infant and under five mortality rates
are very pathetic and also attributed to death from immunisable
diseases, malaria, diarrhea diseases and malnutrition to mention a few.
Facilities to check the excesses of all these preventable cases are
not just available. A
lot have been said and written about Jigawa in the past and blames were
apportioned to certain quarters without really making a sincere effort
to fathom the actual problems and proffer solution accordingly. In May,
1999, the month that Nigerians witnessed the emergence of Alhaji Saminu
Turaki, the ubiquitous and most widely over sea traveled governor in the
country as the captain of the ship that will transform the state from
its rural and poor nature to what every body will envy, although up till
now it is not yet uhuru, majority of the past commentators both within
and without have apportioned most of the blame on the governor and
it seems such one directional attack will continue till 2007 when
someone will assume the mantle of leadership of the already
exploited and bastardized state Another angle to the problem, is the
fact that, majority of the civil servants of the state are residing in
kano and travel to their working place in the morning and come back to
kano in the afternoon, while such habit is highly discouraging and is an
exhibition of non chalant attitude, but never the less, one may not out
rightly blame them because as I mentioned earlier, there is nothing in
the capital that will attract someone to reside there permanently, no
basic health and social services, no adequate communication systems and
no recreation and relaxation areas, what is more worrisome and
consternating is the fact that while almost 100 percent of the indigenes
of the states are practicing one religion, are of the same tribal,
ethnic group, with same culture, norms and values, how ever they
relate and interact based on the emirate council one belong. They
see themselves first from this and that emirate before seeing themselves
as indigenes of the states (a phenomena which is hardly the case else
where). That factor has and will continue to affect the level of
patriotism and commitment towards serving the state as a whole and
unless the youth in the state who are the leaders of tomorrow are
willing to bury that cancerous attitude and let by- gones be
by gones, collective development in the state will not be only sluggish,
a dilly dally, but it will continue to remain a fantasy. My
aim of this writing is to recommend another formula to try for the
development of the state, of course not to put blame on some individuals
and end of doing nothing, as it was the case in the past. In a simple
language, with passion, I vehemently believe that, the involvement of
civil societies in the state will go along way in addressing the
hopeless nature of the people of the state. While I commend DFID for
taking that long term initiative, how ever, at this juncture I have to
say that the implementation of their funded projects are adopting
chameleonic approach and not well coordinated to see glaring results.
The agency has to gear up to hasten research and to do actual
community work. The
involvement of civil societies shall take three dimensions, the
international donor agencies and national NGOs as a matter up urgency
shall partner with the many available NGOs in the state who lack the
where withal and capacity to execute any meaningful projects. In
essence, the work of the agencies would be to over along period of time
build and strengthen the capacity of professional bodies and NGOs to
function effectively, such assistance shall be towards provision of
training, supply of office facilities and funding to execute
educational, heath and social services with the overall aim towards
poverty alleviation. The
second angle, is for the identification of future and potential leaders
of the state to provide them with leadership training in the areas of
democracy and good governance, civic engagement, rights issues and
development, I want to believe that there are many of such leadership
programmes in Nigeria that can accommodate this task of operation save
Jigawa state. |