By Charles Akpeji, Jalingo
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), in collaboration with the Taraba State Primary Health Care Development Agency, has issued an urgent call for greater investment in children, spread across the state.
The organisations, who made the call at the weekend at a one-day retreat with state and local government policymakers on Primary Health Care centres’ performance and sustainability of the PHC Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) implementation, stressed the need for enhanced efforts to ensure that no child in the state is left behind.
The retreat, which took place in Yola, the capital of Adamawa State, was observed to have heralded the presence of local government council chairmen, traditional rulers, critical stakeholders from the health sector, and top government functionaries, among whom included the deputy governor, Alhaji Abdullahi Alkali.
Speaking, the Chief of Bauchi Field Office of UNICEF, Dr. Tushar Rane, highlighted the importance of focusing on the welfare and development of the state’s youngest residents. He urged stakeholders to endeavour to tread extra legitimate miles by committing to provide the much-desired resources and support to children in the state.
Applauding the state government on the success recorded in the implementation of the tripartite PHC-MoU between the state government, GAVI, and UNICEF, which he said has set the state on a positive trajectory in terms of improving health outcomes for women and children, the need for the state government to prepare to take full ownership of its implementation and achievements, he believed, has become necessary.
Rane, who announced that the PHC-MoU is in its last year of investment, reminded the state government of its promise to take over the monthly salary payment of the 450 health workers engaged through the PHC-MoU. While urging the government to tread extra legitimate miles to mainstream the aforementioned numbers of health workers into the state civil service, the need for all hands to be on deck to sustain the programme after the exit of GAVI, he believed, has become necessary.
On his part, the Executive Secretary of the State Primary Health Care Development Agency, Dr. Tukura Nyigwa, who identified non-payment of counterpart funding as one of the major challenges hampering the growth of PHCs in the state, passionately called on the state government to fulfil its part of the PHC-MoU for the sustainability of the programme.
To sustain the programme, the state government, as suggested by him, must ensure the immediate construction of a befitting office accommodation for the staff of the agency, absorb the health workers, and pay its counterpart funds, among others.
Taking the participants through various slides, the Health Officer, UNICEF Bauchi Field Office, Oluseyi Olosunde, who explained why it has become necessary for the government to sustain the programme, said the risk of children dying from preventable ailments will not only be reduced, but will also lead to an increase in the number of children accessing immunizations, adding that home delivery will also reduce, among others.
The state government, through the deputy governor, promised to, as a matter of urgency, go back to the drawing board and put in place relevant mechanisms that will enable the state to take full ownership of the project.
