In 1996 when the then Military Administrator of Oyo State, Colonel Ike Nwosu, inaugurated the Okaka General Hospital, Okaka, Oyo State, the joy of the beneficiary residents knew no bounds. They unanimously saw a bright future ahead of them in terms of receiving quality health care service. Their expectations were not misplaced as the hospital adequately met their health needs. But after some years, the facility began to deteriorate. TUNDE BUSARI reports the hospital’s current state and residents’ losses.
The tragedy of Okaka General Hospital, Okaka, in Oyo State is that should a team of government officials from Ibadan, the seat of power in Oyo State, for instance, pass by the entrance of the medical facility, they will nod their heads in affirmation that the people of the town are blessed with a functional hospital. They will probably return with impressive reports that no disease outbreak would conquer Okaka people and their neighbouring communities. But if the officials could just stop over and venture into the interior of the general hospital, they would scream and rush back to their waiting cars after encountering the eyesore awaiting any visitor inside the building. Yet, Okaka General Hospital is one of the approved COVID-19 testing centres in the state.
From the Waiting Room where patients are expected to wait to be invited by doctors or other medical personnel lies the clear picture of the whole facility. At the time of filing this report, there was no seat in sight in the room to make patients comfortable before they are called into the doctor’s office.
After a patient endures the discomfort at the Waiting Room and enters the doctor’s office, what awaits them is enough to turn them back to seek solution elsewhere. The office not only lacks the basic things expected of a consulting room, it is very uncomfortable going by the intensity of the heat coming out of it.
The sorry tale is the same in other places such as the Outpatients’ Department (OPD), the pharmacy and science technicians’ office.
Nigerian Tribune gathered that one of the reasons the people of the town cast their votes for past administrations of the state was the assurance they had received of getting improved infrastructural amenities, especially as regards the general hospital.
However, for many years, nothing significant has been done to improve their lot. All they are left with now are lamentation and a passionate appeal for help to the incumbent governor, Seyi Makinde, who was said to have also visited the town during his campaign shortly before the 2019 governorship election.
A health worker who pleaded anonymity said aside from the stark absence of necessities, there is also an acute inadequacy of doctors and other medical personnel to attend to patients.
“You know I am not supposed to speak with the press but since this matter is about seeking a solution to this problem of the past eight years, I don’t think I will be right not to speak up. I am not speaking for myself but for the helpless people whose hope rests on this place.
“I always sympathise with them when they rush patients here knowing full well that there is little we can do because of the state of the facilities here. It is just unfortunate that we have found ourselves in this kind of situation in an age when community health is now a global phenomenon,” the man said.
The same disappointment was expressed by a community leader, Mr. Ogundele Rasheed who lamented the hardship his people had been subjected to owing to the neglected general hospital. He urged the state government to quickly intervene in form of total rehabilitation of Okaka General Hospital for effective healthcare delivery.
Rasheed said the people of Okaka have so much hope in the government of Seyi Makinde, whom they see as a representative of the masses as a result of his accomplishments in the past one year in the office.
“We are following him on radio and television and seeing what he is doing in the state. That has given us hope that he will soon come to our aid and rehabilitate our general hospital. He knows that health is wealth; health is what we need here as peasant farmers. If we have good health, we can assure him that we will double our output in food production to the state,” he said.
In the same vein, a 35-year-old woman from Iganna, simply identified as Alhaja Ganiyat, lamented the state of the hospital and the avoidable loss of lives they have so far recorded, a frustration which she said has discouraged the people from taking patients to the hospital as they used to do in the past.
“We are told that people in communities as ours are given better government presence because of our economic importance to the state. We are farmers here; we do make our contribution to the economy of the state. The state should then take good care of us so that we can produce more food. I am pleading with our governor to bail us out of premature death,” she said.
More agitated was the President of Okaka Development Forum, Comrade Baanu Olayinka Babatunde, who claimed that the state of the general hospital was a deliberate action to punish the people of the town, according to him, for unjust reasons. Babatunde said the town did not deserve many years of neglect in spite of the people’s support for past administrations. He advised against politicising issues that have to do with human lives like health service.
“When they talk of dividends of democracy, provision of basic amenities is one of the dividends of democracy. In fact, what we need here are basic facilities to live meaningful lives on our farmland. Well, I want to believe that the God-fearing Governor Makinde will answer our prayers as soon as we expect. We know he means well for the whole state. So, we are waiting for his intervention,” Babatunde stated.
The caretaker chairman of Kajola Local Government Area, Salimonu Afolabi, and his colleague, Lateef Temitope from Okeho, appealed on behalf of the people of Kajola for the upgrading of all the general hospitals in Oke-Ogun with a view to bringing about better living standards for the old and young and also to make the area attractive to investors.
However, there seems to be a ray of hope that attention will be given to the hospital, especially given the efforts so far put in place by the Special Assistant to Governor Makinde on Health Matters, Dr. Abdullateef Ajibike, who is said to have also made a strong appeal to the governor to accord urgent attention to all the state general hospitals in Oke-Ogun to put an end to premature death of infants and the elderly.
During his on-the-spot assessment of all government hospitals at Iseyin Local Government Area, Okaka in Itesiwaju Local Government Area, Okeho in Kajola Local Government Area, Iganna in Iwajowa Local Council Development Area and Iwere-Ile in Iwajowa Local Government federal constituency recently, Dr. Ajibike expressed his disgust at the deplorable situation of the general hospital at Okaka and Okeho, saying that the hospitals could only provide shelter for reptiles.
He blamed the past administrations for total neglect of health care of the people of the region.
Dr Ajibike, therefore, called on Governor Makinde to consider the people of the region by repositioning the hospitals and equipping them with more facilities and adequate, efficient medical personnel.
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