In what has been described as a historic and emotional moment, the Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), yesterday, inducted 70 pioneer graduates of its Department of Nursing Sciences into the nursing profession, bringing an end to a seven-year wait due to the lack of accreditation.

The induction ceremony was conducted by the Registrar of the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria (NMCN), Alhaji Alhassan Ndagi, formally ushering the graduates into the noble healthcare profession.

This was even as the elated inductees, who began their academic journey in 2018 without accreditation for the programme, heaped praises on the Enugu State Governor, Dr Peter Mbah, for the decisive action and strategic intervention, acknowledging that without the governor’s timely support and provision of the facilities necessary for accreditation, their dreams might have ended in frustration.

Speaking at the ceremony, the Chairman of the occasion and Special Adviser to the Governor on Health, Dr Yomi Jaye, described the event as a celebration of vision, resilience, and political will. He recounted how the students had been plunged into despair following years of delay due to the lack of accreditation until Mbah assumed office and swiftly ensured the programme met the standards required by the National Universities Commission (NUC) and the NMCN.

He said: “At the beginning of this administration, we were saddled with the task of strengthening our nursing and medical education. We carried out a baseline assessment of all the institutions and discovered there was no accreditation for 19 years. We approached the NUC and the Nursing Council. The governor backed us with all the necessary resources, and we worked alongside the university day and night. They didn’t just accredit them, they also indexed the backlog.”