By
Jaye Gaskia
 |
|
Nigeria's Minister of
Health, Prof Onyebuchi
Chukwu
|
It is perhaps such an
uncanny truth that the ongoing Ebola Virus Disease [EVD] outbreak in Nigeria
should be so thoroughly representative of the good, the bad and the ugly in our
national life and body polity.
How do I mean? The response
to the outbreak thus far reveals on the one hand a glimpse of the immense
potential that this country is and that we have as a nation; while on the other
hand it is also fast becoming an exposition of all that is wrong with us. The
response unveils a pointer to the almost limitless nature of our potential
strength, while also exposing the abysmal depth of our systemic and structural
challenges.
The way and manner by
which after initially being caught off-guard the health and political
authorities got their acts together and mounted such a coordinated and
effective response that has resulted in more or less containing the outbreak is
quite impressive, and to the extent of its impressiveness, also quite unusual
and unexpected of this inept and greedy treasury looting ruling class.
Although as a
journalist I was speaking with quipped to me and I do believe there is some
truth in this, ‘The response has been so coordinated, forgetting momentarily
inter party and intra elite acrimonies, because the ruling class shared a
common fear of the unimaginable impact of allowing such an outbreak of such a
disease to literally go viral.”
What was this
journalist friend referring to? Let us take a cursory look at the EVD. Like
AIDS it has no cure, and there is no vaccine for its prevention; Like AIDS too
it is an infectious disease; but unlike AIDS, this one can be transmitted not
only through exchange of fluids during sexual intercourse or during blood transfusion
etc, but also simply through coming into contact with body sweat, vomit, stool,
etc of an infected person!
Given this context,
no one is or can be actually safe if the disease were to be allowed to get out
of hand as we have seen in the major epicenters of the current historic
outbreak in Liberia [with more than half of the total number of infections recorded across West Africa thus
far, and more than half of the total number of fatalities]; as well as in
Sierra Leone, both of which countries have large swathes of their territories
in some form of lockdown as a result of the current outbreak.
Even though the
neighbourhoods of the poor can be quarantined and locked down, nevertheless,
the rich, the high and mighty must still interact with the poor. They have
drivers, they have house helps, errand persons, even the home tutors for their
kids who live in these neighbourhoods, and who can more easily come into
contact with the infection and bring it into the homes of the rich.
Herein lies the
trigger, the impetus, and the hidden motive for ruling elite uncharacteristic
collaboration to do any and everything to contain the Ebola Virus Disease. I
mean at the inception of the outbreak, when there was less certainty, we saw
Ministers refusing to shake hands with one another at Federal Executive Council
Meetings!
Now let us turn our
attention to the other worrying parts of the response, those parts that serve
to once again expose the depth, scope and scale of the systemic rot engendered
by the bungling incompetence of gluttonous light fingered elite.
Let us start from the
rear, the ongoing debacle about re-opening of primary and secondary schools
across the country. The Federal government after consultations between the
federal and state education ministries initially pushed school reopening dates
back by about 6 weeks to Mid-October, then after some pressures somersaulted
and reversed the reopening date to 22nd of September.
In pushing back the
dates in the first instance, the FGN had stated conditions that would need to
be met before October 13th; whereas in moving the date forward to 22nd
of September the same FGN was silent on these conditions.
Every school was
supposed to have at least 2 staff members trained in responding to the EVD. Now
beyond the debate on date which is neither here nor there, a number of issues
need to be raised and addressed.
How many Primary
schools are there in the country, public and private? Similarly how many
secondary schools are there in the country, again public and private? How many
pupils are in each of these schools, and are in all of these schools
altogether? How many teachers are in each, and all of these schools?
At the rate of two
teachers to be trained per school, how many teachers will need to be thus
trained in each LGA, in each state, and across the federation? Where will they
be trained? And how will they be trained? Will they be trained in batches? And
how long will the training take; that is what is the length of time that will
be needed to complete the training of all of these teachers? How many special
EVD monitors and supervisors will be needed in each LGA, in each state, across
the whole country to ensure compliance and quality, and ensure that every
school is covered?
What support
infrastructure needs to be put in place to ensure that the training of teachers
become integral part of a seamless response healthcare delivery system? How
many isolation and treatment centers need to put in place to cater for all the
schools working on various assumptions with regards to possible scenarios [for
example if 1% , 2%, 5% or 10% of students were to need isolation etc?
So have the trainings
begun? At what stage of the trainings are we in right now? How many teachers
and schools have been covered? And how many more teachers and schools need to
be covered?
My worry is that we
might end up with a situation where only a few highbrow public and private
schools are covered, either because of the exceptional links of proprietors to
the high and mighty, or because the children of the high and mighty attend
these chosen schools.
In such a scenario,
what we would have is a situation where the high and mighty tries to take care
of itself while leaving the overwhelming majority of pupils, the children of
the poor at the mercy of the EVD outbreak.
I have often said
that the future of any society, whether it will survive, whether it will
progress, or whether it will be able to compete effectively with its peers
depends on the amount of investment in time, care, education, and efforts put into
its children.
The question to ask
right now is whether any of the foregoing has been factored into the
considerations of the government regarding re-opening date for pupils. What
parents and teachers want to know is not only the empty assurances of a political
elite that suffers from gross trust and confidence deficits among the populace;
what they need to know is evidence of the hard thinking, reflection, planning
and operationalizing arrangements being put in place to safe guard the lives of
their kids and their children, as well as secondarily of the parents and the
teachers.
Surely none of the
aforementioned is rocket science. Surely governance shouldn’t be this
catastrophically difficult.
Now let us quickly
look at the other issues, those around funding the response. The Federal
Government recently announced it was setting aside N1,9bn to manage the
response, although the minister of health was then later reported to have
clarified that the bulk of this money will be spent buying vehicles! So how will
be various isolation and treatment centers be funded and equipped? Are we
waiting on donors to purchase the necessary kits, equipment and other treatment
facilities?
States governments
have also begun to announce huge sums of monies in their hundreds of millions
to tackle the outbreak.
What all of these
frenzied resource allocation drives have lacked thus far is transparency and
accountability. How are these monies being appropriated? If this was truly an
emergency why have the National and State Assemblies not convened emergency
sessions on the EVD outbreak?
Why have the Federal
and State executive councils not prepared and forwarded to the emergency
sessions of the National and State Assemblies Supplementary bills to
appropriate funds to tackle the emergency? Why are there no detailed user
friendly, citizen centered response plans in the public domain for everyone to
see and access and assess?
In civilized climes,
these ought to be basic rudimentary prerequisites underpinning a comprehensive,
transparent, and accountable response.
My suspicion, borne
out of decades of treasury looting propensity of the ruling class is that, once
again, as it happened with the response to the 2012 flood disaster, or to the
response to the ongoing Boko Haram insurgency, ‘Our collective Grief has become
a Call to Loot for the ruling elite’, and ‘our Societal pain, has become a
cynical source of gain for this marauding elite’.
For them, beyond the
fear of the outbreak getting out of hand and consuming them along with the
poor, the response to the EVD outbreak once again presents an opportunity to
loot. And this is why we must be vigilant, and insist on transparency, on
accountability, on due process, and also insist on rigorous open reflection,
planning and implementation of the response.
And calling weekly
media briefings to update the citizens through the media is not and cannot be a
substitute for rigorous all round stakeholder involvement and participation in
planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the response.
For instance are the
various organised platforms of the stakeholders in any way involved in this
response beyond being occasionally consulted and or briefed? What roles if any
are the NUT, ANCOPPS, COPSHON, NMA, MHWUN etc playing in a structured, systematic
and coordinated response to the EVD outbreak in the country?
I am once again
forced to the conclusion that this current ruling class is inherently inept and
incompetent to govern us, the only thing it is adept at doing is looting the
treasury, and maneuvering around the corridors and bedrooms of power.
The lesson once again
is that we have a duty to take destiny back into our own hands, to Take Back
Nigeria from the death grip of these Vagabonds In Power.
Follow
me on Twitter: @jayegaskia & @[DPSR]protesttopower; Interact with me on
FaceBook: Jaye Gasakia & Take Back Nigeria
JAYE
GASKIA IS NATIONAL COORDINATOR OF PROTEST TO POWER MOVEMENT [P2PM], &
CO-CONVENER OF SAY NO CAMPAIGN [SNC]
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