By Okeh, Onyekachi Chukwuemeka

When Dale Carnegie of the United States of America made very clear cut remarks on people and how what gives them fulfillment says so much about whom they are in one of his global best sellers called ‘How to Win Friends and influence people’, the image of the NAUTH poster son for excellence came screeching through my mind.

This image of his raced through my mind simply because in a society where there are overwhelming reasons and acutely verifiable facts to justify all forms of non-performance in public offices as a result of lack of resources, a dark skinned, energetic, socially conscious Ufuma born but Enugu trained, extremely brilliant and versatile Nnamdi Azikiwe University trained Medical Doctor, an Associate Professor of Obstetrics And Gynaecology, whom having made a very clear mark as an academic, obstetrician and gynaecologist in active service as a soldier of the hospital wards with special interest in labour wards has taken the accolades trip around him several notches higher by the prowess and mind-blowing skills he has brought to the ever busy corridors of administration.

Over the years, we all have known him with the nickname, ’‘Ochinanwata" which loosely translates to “One who started off as a leader at a very early age”. This nickname has seen its manifestations in most responsibilities he has handled with one of his very latest casualties of sweet memories being the responsibility to transform Nnamdi Azikiwe University Teaching hospital (NAUTH) to being one of the first five (5) tertiary healthcare facilities in Nigeria irrespective of wherever we are now on the grading scale of tertiary Medical institutions in the country.

A few years back most people would have effectively dismissed us as wild dreamers if we had dared to utter the word ever that under a Dr. Joseph Odilichukwu Ugboaja leadership, the possibility of moving the operations of the Teaching hospital from the temporary site where we had obviously exhausted all there is to structural development, to a permanent site where we have the space to erect structures that would depict our present and future reality as an institution, in which the very best of health care services would be rendered to our fellow country men and women would not have been believed to ever come through. The infrastructural transformation at the hospital permanent site has so much to do with the quality of leadership in charge at the hospital and that of the members of the Management board who are stopping at nothing to give the leadership the required support that is needed.

However, on assumption of office the Chief Medical Director who missed being a Catholic Priest by the whiskers having a good knowledge of the holy book understood from the very first day that if he was going to make anything out of this responsibility of leading such a massive institution, that he needed to count the cost and get his tools ready to deliver excellently on the job. This can be largely said to be responsible for the quality of work that has been done in the hospital both at the permanent site and the temporary sites. The young Chief Medical Director is not done yet with what he hopes to deliver but for being articulate enough to know what would be needed to deliver maximally on this project, the resounding success speaks for itself.

Finally, one would be correct to say that it is obvious that giving leadership of exceptional quality is one of the things that spurs the Chief Medical Director on. He derives extreme pleasure and unquantifiable fulfillment in serving his subjects at all times to the best of his ability as can be seen at Nnamdi Azikiwe University Teaching Hospital (NAUTH). The destination he is piloting the hospital to is clear to all and it is obvious that in a few years to come, there would be strategic reasons why Nnewi town would be besieged by all sorts of guests who would be here on Medical tourism. Like they would always say, so much starts and ends with leadership.

Some more projects at the Permanent Site.

Some more projects..

And these!!