The wife of President, Aisha Buhari, speaking at the opening of a two day Stakeholders’ meeting in Abuja has decried the poor state of the State House Medical Centre saying that “if somebody like Mr President can spend several months outside Nigeria, then you wonder what will happen to a man in the street”.
The theme of the meeting was ‘Reproductive, Maternal New Born Child, Adolescent Health and Nutrition’.
She explained that she was forced to go to a private hospital owned by foreigners when she was ill stating that the x-ray machine in Aso Clinic was not working. She added that the budget allotted to the clinic must be accounted for.
“Few weeks ago I was sick as well. They advised me to take the first flight out to London; I refused to go. I said I must be treated in Nigeria because there is a budget for an assigned clinic to take care of us. If the budget is N100m we need to know how the budget is spent”.
“Along the line, I insisted they call Aso clinic to find out if the x-ray machine is working. They said it was not working. They didn’t know I was the one that was supposed to be in that hospital at that very time”.
“I had to go to a hospital that was established by foreigners 100%. What does that mean?”
Mrs Buhari explained that Nigeria had good policies but emphasized that implementation is the problem.
“So I think it is high time we did the right thing. If something like this can happen to me, there is no need for me to ask the Governor’s wives what is happening in their States”.
The First Lady said that even though the Chief Medical Director, Dr Husain Munir, who was present at the meeting would not be happy that she spoke publicly on the issue, the truth must be told.
“I am sure Dr Munir will not like me saying this but I have to say it out. As the Chief Medical Director, there are a lot of constructions going on in this hospital but there is no single syringe here”.
“What does that mean? Who will use the building? We have to be good in reasoning. You are building new buildings and there is no equipment, no consumables in the hospital and the construction is still going on”.
It should be worthy of note that the State House Medical Centre, is established to take care of the President, Vice President, their families as well as members of staff of the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
