What Rafiu Ajakaye, CPS to Kwara State Governor, said on the N1bn FG COVID-19 support to state governments: 👇
- Yes. We got N100m for the REDISSE (World Bank) programme which was disbursed thru the NCDC. We announced this some months ago.
- If you check the revised budget of 2020, we have already appropriated the N1bn for renovation/equipping of health facilities. That N1bn is from the FG. It is to support states for the COVID-19 fight. One particular state got N10bm while another got N5bn. Kwara, like some others, got N1bn. And this money is already in the revised 2020 budget. With it, we plan to become the go-to place for eye care in the North after Kaduna. Today in the entire North, the only sophisticated public eye care services are obtainable only in Kaduna. Kwara wants to beat that, thereby attracting traffic from the north and southwest (Ekiti/Osun especially). This fund would help in this regard.
Today, Kwara govt has just one dental chair which is not even functional. The Nigerian Navy (FG) has two (in Offa). We want to get new ones and other sophisticated machines to make the state another hub for dental care in the north.
From this money (plus donations given to the state for COVID-19 and already appropriated), we also want to build a molecular lab in the state to strengthen Kwara’s capacity to deal with some diseases.
The renal dialysis machine at the GHI cannot be used for persons with infectious diseases. From the money, the govt wants to get more to service such persons as they are also entitled to effective public health care system.
We are also short of advanced MRI/CT scan/x-ray machines to aid early diagnosis of such ailments like breast cancer, prostrate, and others. This would help Kwara and Kwarans a lot as the world records prevalence of such diseases for which early detection is key.
Besides, the govt is also set to fix/equip such major general hospitals in Omu Aran; Lafiagi; Okuta; Offa; GHI; Sobi Specialist; Centre Igboro children hospital, and a few others.
All of those would be done from the money which has already been appropriated in the 2020 revised budget.
- As for getting another N1.1bn from World Bank, the Kwara State Government is yet to get any such money from the World Bank, pls. What we got was the N100m for REDISSE which we had since announced and the purpose (training) for which the money was meant is already being coordinated by the World Bank/NCDC team.