Olugbenga ADANIKIN reports about the travails of the residents of Iraye, an NNPC host-community in Ogun State that got a 20-bed modern hospital facility, after almost 20 years of waiting, but still lacks access to healthcare. The clinic is meant to serve residents of 14 neighbouring villages. Though the state government is expected to take ownership after completion, it has not done so and the clinic is now overtaken by bushes.

“QUEEN Elizabeth took this route when she came to Nigeria in 1956,” that is how Rasheed Alimi, the Community Head of Iraye started his conversation with this reporter.

“This is where she passed,” he said, pointing at the first federal road linking Odonguyan, Ikorodu in Lagos state to Sagamu in Ogun state – now abandoned.

He made this comment to stress the point that the community has been neglected despite decades of existence.

Iraye is located in Sagamu Local Government Area (LGA) of Ogun State, an ancient town with no modern infrastructure. Since independence, the community has craved for basic amenities such as electricity, water, healthcare facilities.

Long years of waiting for a health care facility yet left to rot after completion

“It is over 15 years that I have been making appeal to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC),” says Alimi. “They asked what I wanted but I told them I don’t need money but something physical that would be beneficial to the whole community as a hospital, good road and electricity.”

He later added a gas station to his request. In March 2019, the Nigerian Pipelines and Storage Company, a subsidiary of the NNPC, came to his rescue. A 20-bed hospital facility was constructed and commissioned by the company in the presence of the state government. The clinic was delivered with a new Mikano power generating set and borehole facility.

Women, especially pregnant ones, were full of excitements when the clinic was completed. Located next to the chief’s house, it is meant to serve 14 rural communities.

“I thought it was a joke until the project became a reality.”

But nine months after it was commissioned, Ogun State government has neither deployed medical staff to manage the clinic nor stocked the clinic with drugs.

“When pregnant women who used to line up at the gate of the health centre eventually got tired of visiting, they stopped coming,” the security guard at the clinic told The ICIR.

Findings by The ICIR showed that the hospital facility is equipped with modern medical technology.

Left to ruin

Now the hospital is covered with bushes. The new power generating set left unused has also begun to depreciate. Inside, thick cobwebs are everywhere, and beds are covered with dust, though, the painting is still fresh,

The ICIR counted 10 modern hospital beds in the male ward and 10 beds in the female ward. Aside, there is a laboratory for blood test, consulting rooms, large reception for patients, nurses’ bay and delivery rooms, stores with extra medical equipment such as oxygen, baby weigh, among others.

The facility is also equipped with giant refrigerators; air conditioners, modern furniture, waste bins of different colours and a parking space that could accommodate about eight cars. The clinic is enclosed by high fence.

Now part of the land in the premises has been converted to cassava farmland by the security guard at the gate who has been owed wages for seven months. Two security men were hired by NNPC for the hospital at inception.

“The state or local government ought to pay their income but till now, we have not heard anything,” Alimi told The ICIR.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTM6tZ1xoX4&feature=emb_title

READ MORE: https://www.icirnigeria.org/multimillion-naira-nnpc-20-bed-clinic-left-to-waste-in-ogun-community-where-people-lack-access-to-hospital/

Wasteful government.

Where did we leave our maintenance brain in this country. Yet people will complsin that the government and companies are not providing amenities for the citizens?

Maintenance Culture is one of the things that our Leaders lack, our health sector is full of quacks and incompetent Medical Practitioners, Our glory as giant of Africa is sliding each day.