On 20 August 2022, 70-year-old Umaru Kalenjeni, a resident of the Kalenjeni community, rushed his pregnant daughter-in-law, Asmau Sanni, to the General Hospital in Binji, Sokoto, when she fell into labour.
Finding adequate transportation to the hospital took hours. The road to the hospital was also torturous, worsening Asmau’s pain. By the time she got to the hospital, she had developed such complications that she was referred to the better-equipped Maryam Abacha hospital.
The journey from Kalenjeni to Binji hospital and then onwards to the Maryam Abacha hospital took three hours.
“We were depressed when the doctor informed us that Cesarean delivery (C-section) would be done and the operation would cost N40,000. The money for medication and ward fees is N15,000 daily, and this huge money was paid for the four weeks she spent at Maryam Abacha hospital before she recovered,” says Umaru.
“The long-distance of the hospital to our community and the bad road is what contributed to her child delivery complication, which made the doctor perform surgery on her before giving birth. I spent N500,000 for her operation, medicine, and for her stay in the hospital,” he lamented.
Umaru added that his biological daughter is presently in the Sokoto Specialist hospital to deliver her baby because there is no functional primary health care centre that is close enough.
“Had it been we could equip the hospital and employ the doctors in these hospitals, we would have done it by now. I am pleading to our government to equip our hospital with facilities and doctors so that it can be useful to us,” he pleaded.
Thousands of victims share Umaru’s fate in Asarawa village in Kalenjeni, Tangaza Local Government of Sokoto State.
Members of the community have to travel several miles to access health care.
Flashes of False Hope
A lawmaker, representing Tangaza/Gudu Federal Constituency, Isah Bashir, sponsored a N33 million Primary Healthcare Centre (PHC) project in 2012 as part of the Zonal Intervention Project.
The residents were delighted that their misery would become a thing of the past, but their delight was short-lived when Umairatu Consults, the company that won the contract, abandoned the project at the lintel level.
A few years later, the same lawmaker raised their hope again and facilitated another health project two minutes away from the abandoned health care. The project was awarded to Anit Synergy Global Company Limited under the supervision of the Federal Ministry of Health. More than eight years after its completion, the building has never been opened as there is no medical equipment in the hospital.
A visit to the project location revealed that the hospital has become dilapidated and overtaken by bushes, lizards, and other reptiles.
Again in 2016, another N30 million was budgeted in the Zonal Intervention Project for the construction of a third Primary Healthcare Centre in Tundu village in Kelenjeni, a few miles from Asarawa village in Kalenjeni where the two abandoned hospital projects are located.
The project was awarded to Bloomz Development Limited under the supervision of the National Primary Health Care Development Agency.
Further findings showed another N40m was budgeted in the 2017 Zonal Intervention Project for the completion of the hospital at Kalenjeni in Tangaza local government, Sokoto State. Though the project was finally completed in 2018, the healthcare centre is still not open for use due to a lack of medical equipment.
Garba Umar, the community leader of Tunga village in Kalenjeni complained about the suffering of the residents of the area due to the lack of access to healthcare facilities.
“The closest healthcare we visit in Tangaza is a 25 minutes journey from Kalenjeni,” Umar explained.
“Before getting a commercial car to carry sick people in this village is time-consuming, and anything can happen to people needing urgent medical attention. The expenses of travelling to a far place to get access to health care are saddled with the patient’s relatives, and the road to our village is not motorable,” he complained.
He said it was unfortunate that residents are going to far places for healthcare services despite the three multi-million naira healthcare projects rotting away in the area.
Yahuza Magaji, a resident of Asarawa in Kalenjeni disclosed that when it was time for his sister to deliver her baby, they rushed her to Sokoto State Specialist Hospital, where they performed a Cesarean Section before she could deliver her baby.
She added that it took them long hours before they could get a car to carry them to the hospital in town, which is almost two hours from Kalenjeni.
“As we speak now, her doctor said she will not be coming until she fully recovers. If our hospital was functioning, we would not have gone anywhere seeking medical attention. To get a car to transport people is a problem and the long journey and the bad road is causing complications during child delivery for our women,” she lamented.
Abubakar Hakimi, the community leader of Tunga village in Kalenjeni expressed his disappointment over the ineffective hospital in his community, noting that he was not consulted before commencing the work on the project.
He recalls his daughter’s agonies when battling stomach pain and how it took them almost an hour to get a cab to carry her to the hospital in the neighbouring village. He added that she wouldn’t have gone through the pain if the healthcare facilities in their community were functioning.
“The lawmaker’s boys came to remove the doors and promised to bring better doors. In the case of an emergency, we visit Tangaza hospital, which is 25 minutes distance from here. We used to go to Binji General hospital, which is a one-hour journey from Kalenjeni and Sokoto Specialist hospital, which is almost two hours journey from our village due to bad roads,” he noted.
Sanni Bello, the Waziri of Tunda in Kalenjeni pleaded with the government to equip the hospital so residents would stop travelling long distances to access healthcare services.
Usman Namaiwa, a resident of Tunda in Kalenjeni said residents spend more than N8,000 on transport to take their pregnant wives and sick family to hospitals in distant places. Yet the multi-million naira health projects are wasting away in the bush.
“It’s a bitter experience for us. We have a hospital beside us and we are still spending from our little earnings to travel to get health care and no step has been taken by the lawmaker that facilitated the project,” he said.
Yahaya Issa, a resident of Asarawa in Kalenjeni said that after 8 pm, the health workers close at the PHC in Tangaza, which is the nearest healthcare facility in the area.
Ministry, Agency react
The Spokesperson to the Federal Ministry of Health, Ahmadu Chidanya, said he has made some inquiries from the directors in the ministry about the details of the projects and was told the NPHCDA is in the right position to respond to questions about the abandoned primary healthcare centres.
Muhammad Ohitototo, the Spokesperson for the NPHCDA said it is the Secretary of Primary Health Care in Sokoto that can speak to contracts such as these. He said every state’s executive secretary has information on the contracts being executed within their state since it is meant to serve the state.
“No job is offered for renovation or construction of primary health care without contacting the state authorities. Every primary health care project done at the state level is for the state and not for the NPHCDA,” he noted.
Adamu Abdullahi, the Executive Secretary of the Sokoto Primary Health Care Development Agency, said his agency is unaware of the two completed projects because the facility has not been handed over to them by the lawmaker for posting of staff and supervision.
He said the agency was not contacted at the beginning of those projects and after they are completed.
He added that abandoning the two completed projects is not their fault but the fault of the lawmaker who knows where he got the money to execute the project.
All efforts to reach Isah Bashir, the former lawmaker representing Tangaza/Gudu, proved abortive as several calls and text messages sent to him were ignored, including a Whatsapp message that showed the read receipt.
Contractors React
Babatunde Aboderin, the Managing Director of Bloomz Development, said the fund approved for the project was just for the construction of the hospital building and not for the provision of equipment.
He alleged that the agency has not paid his retention fees up till now, and his company was not paid to supply medical equipment and furniture.
Umairatu Consult said the money expended in the project up to the lintel level is his funds, and no mobilisation fees were paid to him before starting the work on the project in 2012.
He added that it took the intervention of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) before he was able to obtain the money from the agency five years after he stopped the project at the lintel level.
“I am surprised it is still there. I went back to the lawmakers that he has to reintroduce the project and he did and gave me a letter at that time for it to be recaptured in the budget so that we can complete it. But I told him that they have to pay all the money before starting any work and cannot spend any money. When we got the money for the work we did five years ago, it was useless because the differential was not paid,” he said.
The construction of PHCs without proper liaison and linkages with state and local governments where they are sited has been spotlighted as a challenge to the functionality of PHCs in Nigeria. The situation in the Kalenjeni community appears to be an example of this disconnect.
In the game of “who is to blame?” being played by state agencies and contractors, the people of Kalenjeni community continue to suffer, with their access to healthcare severely compromised.