Stakeholders call for more investments in family planning programmes

As regards the high rate of maternal mortality and to improve reproductive health care in the country, Association for the Advancement of Family Planning (AAFP) has called on the federal government to invest more on family planning and introduce family planning policies.

Chairman AAFP, Dr. Ejike Oji, made this statement at the Civil Society and Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC) meeting with media on mobilization for family planning in collaboration with the Partnership for Advocacy in Child and Family Health in Nigeria (PACFaH), in Abuja, yesterday.

According to the AAFP, over the years no allotment has been made to the ministry of health particularly for family planning and this has therefore ranked Nigeria as the second largest country next to India with high maternal deaths at childbirth.

He noted that family planning improves the prosperity in a nation alongside protect the lives of women who have been blessed with high fertility rate, while calling on the government to take the issue of family planning very seriously, spacing of children gives the woman the chance to recover before she goes in for the next child, not forgetting the economic situation within the country, he stressed.

According to Oji, the main focus of the organization are on four key areas, but the most vital part is the need for partnership among Civil Society Organization in Nigeria and by so advocate for better outcome for women and children’s health in Nigeria.

He said: “Over the years, the allocation that is made to the Federal Ministry of Health, there hasn’t been any allocation specifically for issues of family planning. But for the past three to four years the Association of Family Planning has been able to advocate to government to put money.

“Having said that, the money has not been released timely as at when due and for the purchase of commodity. And one of the challenges we have in Health Centre is that even when resources have been released for commodities to be purchased, they haven’t been any money to provide for supply and consumable of all these services for the women.

“About 16 per cent of Nigeria women said they wanted Family Planning but they are not getting it because of these challenges, either the commodities are not there and even when the commodities are there, making sure that the commodities are supplied from the warehouses to the service delivery centres is also absent.”

Oji added that the health of a woman is the health of a nation and an effective family planning programme has a direct impact on the economy of a nation as a whole.

Speaking earlier, representatives of AAFP, Chinwe Onumonu, during her Presentation of the ‘Media Brief on the Case for Nigerian Government to Invest in Family Planning to Save the Lives of our Women and Children’, said, “ This Media brief seeks to explain the connection between the Family Planning (FP) and the health of women and children, the economic growth of the nation and how investing in FP can help achieve this. It prioritizes the actions the media professionals can take to get government to invest in family planning.”

She revealed: “Since the inception of FP in Nigeria, it has been driven and funded totally by donors. The government of Nigeria committed funds ($3million) to FP for the very first time in 2011, this was given on the background that the total estimated cost of procuring only commodities from 2011- 2015 was about $50million.

“Currently the donors are still providing funding completely for the most components of FP programme. FP has been universally recognized as one of the key pillars and most cost effective means of achieving safe motherhood.”

According to her family planning is a means to allow individuals and couples to wait for and attain their desired number of children and the spacing and the timing of their births.

Speaking was the Chairman of AAFP Board of Trustees, Alhaji Sani Umar Jabbi, said that the media has a lot of vital role to play.

“We should be creating lives based on quality on ground not for size or land mass but the kind of quality of life of the environment. When you talk of family planning based on population you would send a negative perception to the Muslim world in Nigeria especially far north.”