Ngige’s lamentable gaffe on medical doctors

SPEAKING on the Sunrise Daily programme on Channels TV last week, the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, provoked the ire of Nigerians when he stated that he was not bothered about the decision of medical doctors who choose to leave Nigeria to practice abroad. The minister said: “I’m not worried. We have surplus. If we have a surplus, we export. I was taught Biology and Chemistry by Indian teachers in my secondary school days. They were surplus in their country. We have a surplus in the medical profession in our country. I can tell you this. It is my area, we have excess. We have enough, more than enough. Quote me.”

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If there were no evidence that this piece of sophistry was purveyed in reality, it could have been difficult to believe that a member of Nigeria’s federal cabinet actually uttered it. The statement is so blatantly false and the argument canvassed so puerile that it is difficult to associate it with an enlightened member of Nigeria’s political class. But then given the evident intellectual and moral vacuity in the country, particularly in recent times, it should perhaps not have been shocking as it sounded to most right-thinking Nigerians. Contrary to Dr. Ngige’s averment that there is nothing wrong with Nigerian doctors going abroad to ply their trade, available evidence suggests that the country is actually haemorrhaging from the loss of its medical personnel to the advanced countries. To date, most of the doctors in the country are products of public universities whose education was heavily subsidised by the government. To lose such skilled human power to other, though admittedly saner, climes simply because of the inclement Nigerian environment and the struggle for survival is both tragic and lamentable.

Besides, the minister certainly did not expect to be taken seriously when he posited that Nigeria had enough doctors to export to the world, and wished those planning to exit its shores Godspeed. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the recommended ratio of doctors to people is 600: 1. Now, according to statistics from the Nigeria Medical Council, 72,000 doctors are currently registered and licensed in the country. Out of this figure, only 40,000 doctors practice is Nigeria. With an estimated population of approximately 200 million people, the doctor to people ratio is 5000:1. And yet Dr. Ngige believes that Nigeria has enough doctors to export around the world and donate to other people’s progress and development? Do facts and statistics matter these days?

Dr. Ngige apparently exults in the fact that Nigerian doctors in the Diaspora remit money home. But pray, why can’t Nigerian doctors be encouraged to stay in the country and have foreigners come to them for treatment? Why can they not be provided with a conducive environment in which they can contribute, first and foremost, to Nigeria’s development? Currently, wealthy and not so wealthy Nigerians travel abroad for medical treatment, and a considerable number of them are actually attended to by Nigerian doctors in their countries of medical refuge. If Nigeria’s health sector undergoes the necessary surgery in terms of equipment and good working conditions, foreigners would not mind coming to the country for treatment. What plans are afoot to actualise this lofty goal?

Ngige is indeed grossly mistaken if he thinks that by going abroad, Nigerians doctor would be contributing hugely to Nigeria’s GDP through remittances. In case he has not grasped the point, the bulk of the money earned by Nigerian doctors abroad is expended on their living expenses, including mortgage, in the countries where they are domiciled. The money they remit home, the money that Dr. Ngige has his attention fixed on, is comparatively a mere pittance meant to take care of their poor and destitute family members at home. Anyone who thinks that Nigerian doctors remit the bulk of their earnings abroad home is living in Plato’s cave.

While the Labour Minister is busy exulting in Nigeria’s supposed glut in the production of surgeons, the Bauchi State governor-elect, Mr. Bala Mohammed, recently revealed that the state has only 44 medical doctors. Sadly, Ngige’s pedestrian comments are typical of this administration. From asking land owners to surrender their lands to herdsmen or risk death, to asking victims of genocide to accommodate their countrymen, this administration hasn’t exactly covered itself in glory. If the Labour Minister’s statement is a gauge on the quality of people in power, the picture that emerges is certainly unflattering. The statement is a sign of a ruling elite in decay, totally devoid from reality. Such an elite cannot advance the cause of national development.