Kwaita-Sabo residents lament over dilapidated health centre

Residents of Kwaita –Sabo in Wako ward of Kwali area council of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) have expressed concern over the dilapidated state of their health care centre. The spokesman of the community, Jethro Musa Bala, who spoke with Aso Chronicle on Saturday, said the state of the health centre has become a source […]

Residents of Kwaita –Sabo in Wako ward of Kwali area council of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) have expressed concern over the dilapidated state of their health care centre.

The spokesman of the community, Jethro Musa Bala, who spoke with Aso Chronicle on Saturday, said the state of the health centre has become a source of worry to the community since there was no other health facility close by.

He said since the health centre was built in 2003, it had not been rehabilitated, adding that the medical equipment inside the centre have decayed, hampering service delivery at the facility.

According to him, patients in the community and some neighbouring villages who usually come to seek for medical treatment at the health centre now travel to Abaji, Kwali and Gwagwalada.

He said the community elders had written severally to successive administrations on the need for them to rehabilitate and re-equip the health centre, but that had not yielded any fruitful results.

“I can recall that the only thing the present administration did since he assumed office two years ago, was this intervention of drugs resolving scheme which he initiated. And apart from that, nothing again,” he said.  

A house wife, Mrs. Asibi Laruba, who had a baby strapped to her back, told our reporter that she came from Kwaita Tsoho to see the doctor because her son had been stooling and vomiting.

She however said they were not properly treated due to lack of personnel and facilities at the clinic.

Our reporter observed that the walls of building have cracked, some plastic chairs broken, and the floors have broken up.

A medical doctor at the centre, Mr. Abraham Dandukpa, who spoke with Aso Chronicle, also said the dilapidated state of the health centre had been a major concern to the personnel.

“In fact, thieves have stolen all the solar panels that were installed at the health centre so we cannot use the refrigerator to store drugs,” he said.

He said despite the dilapidated state of the health centre, he and some other health personnel have always attended to patients and prescribe drugs to them.

He, therefore, appealed to the authorities of the council under the leadership of Mr. Joseph K. Shazin, to rehabilitate and quip the health centre and provide security that will guard the facilities.

When contacted, the chairman of Kwali area council, Mr. Joseph K, Shazin, said the council had already provided for the rehabilitation and provision of facilities at the community’s health centre in the council’s budget.

He said arrangement would soon commence to embark on rehabilitation of not only the Kwaita-Sabo health centre, but other rural clinics that were also dilapidated across the council.

In a related development, residents of Sabo in Kuje area council have also expressed concern over lack of health personnel that will man the newly completed health centre at the community.

The traditional ruler of the community, Malam Abubakar T. Danjuma, who spoke with Aso Chronicle, said since the health centre was built and equipped by the then office of the FCT Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) over three years ago; it has remained without health professionals. 

He said only one health personnel who is native of the community  has volunteered to offer skeletal services to patients, adding that the lack of health personnel has compelled patients to travel to neigbouring Kwaku village to seek for medical attention.

“If it were during rainy season, there is no way patients can cross the river, not to even talk of the bad state of the road, where a vehicle hardly plies,” he said.

He said women had continued to travel to neighbouring Kwaku village to be delivered of their babies because the newly built clinic was yet to offer services.

 “As I am speaking to you, most of the patients who come from these neighbouring villages to seek for medical treatment here are now finding it difficult because there are no doctors or nurses to attend to them apart from one of our son who has volunteered to offer services to them,” he said.

The village chief therefore appealed to the authorities of the council, under the leadership of Alhaji Abdullahi D. Galadima, to post health personnel that would attend to patients in the area.

He also called on the council to collaborate with Kwali area council to rehabilitate the from Ijah-Sabo road to reduce the suffering of residents. 

When contacted, the chairman of Kuje area council, Alhaji Abdullahi D. Galadima, who spoke through his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Haruna Usman, said the council was yet to receive the complaints of the issue of lack of health personnel at the clinic.

He said there was the need for residents, especially, the village head and elders to channel challenges they were facing in their domain through their ward councilor for onward action.