The Permanent Secretary in the Ministry for Tertiary, Dr Sarajo Sa’ad, has passed a damming verdict on the current state of the Niger State private health institutions, saying it is below the pass mark.
Said who observed that the current State of Niger health institutions is unimpressive, said he came to this conclusion after undertaking an unannounced visit to some of the private health institutions in the state, in what could pass for a sting operation.
The permanent secretary noted that while the operators were trying their best, under the prevailing circumstances of paucity of funds a lot still needs to be done in order to get the institutions to become of standard grade.
Said who went on the monitoring visit with the ministry’s director of Quality Assurance, Amina Gwogwo, and the director of Students Affairs, Habila Yahaya, disclosed to Arewa PUNCH that the aim of the tour was to assess the facilities at the institutions and ascertain their true state.
The team visited three private health institutions that were in session after returning from the Sallah break.
Their first stop was at Newgate University, which also operates the Newgate Health College which the Permanent Secretary adjudged as the best among the three schools visited.
The school authorities took the visitors on a walk of the institute to assess the quality of all the school’s facilities including the library, laboratory, demonstration room, classrooms, and the institute’s clinic.
While the tour lasted, the team observed some lapses, which, “did not conform with the standard of an average health institute.”
For instance, the visitors saw a couple of students who were looking unkempt and not dressed in the traditional nursing uniform. They pointed out to the authorities of the school that such practice could send the wrong information to a prospective parent who intends to enrol his ward into the institute.
The monitoring team thereafter visited the Rolim College of Hygiene and Health Sciences and also the Al-ASAS Health Foundation School of Health Technology Minna.
The ministry’s team also went round to the various facilities of both institutes and observed that their facilities needed to be seriously improved upon. They admonished the authorities of both schools to work on their facilities as well as the schools’ intakes.
On the staff strength of both schools, the ministry urged them to ensure that the quality of the teaching staff met international best standards.
Sa’ad who spoke with Arewa PUNCH on their findings after the tours, pointed out that with evidence of what was on ground, particularly at the last two schools visited, there was ample evidence that the quality of the private health institutions in the state was poor and there was the urgent need for improvement.
“Generally, you can not compare in terms of infrastructures, the capacities, the staffing and all that… but some are better than some. But the very few we have visited today, I can tell you are satisfactory in the sense that the structures are there and the staffing, both academic and non-academic. What is lacking with most of them is the maturity and the quality of staff that they have. You can see that some of them are young graduates, and inexperienced.
“Not that they don’t have the qualification. but the maturity to run schools. Clearly, I have seen that gap. Also, in many of the schools, the classes are not filled up to capacity compared with what you see outside.
“When you visit the schools, you hear the excuses they are giving that some of their students have yet to resume from the Sallah break or that some of them have yet to pay their fees.
“Then, there is the accessibility to the schools’ problem. Many of the access roads are bad. Once somebody mentions the name of the school, you should be able to find the school, but this is not the case. Still, there is room for improvement.
“I will generally rate them as satisfactory. What I will only add is that the structures are there, like the libraries, the clinic, the demonstration rooms all the gadgets are there, but the manpower or the people to manage the schools are not there.
“But if you ask them, they will give you one excuse or the other. Sometimes, they bring in part-time staff to teach the students. But whether part-time or full-time, it is very difficult for the ministry to ascertain this.
“The libraries too are not very well equipped if you ask them they will tell you they have e-library and can always access books online. As I mentioned earlier, there is room for improvement, and there are areas we need to strongly look at. The facilities are there, but the management, the people who are supposed to manage those places, some of them are below expectation.
“Sincerely speaking, the current state of our health system is poor. They will say show me your friends and I will tell you who you are. You begin to wonder, are they really health institutions, because the premises are unkempt, and the classes are not as clean as you expect them to be? Some of the students are not on their uniforms like a nurse, some of them are just wearing mufti so, you can hardly differentiate between a visitor and students.
“Those gaps are some of the reasons why we went to the schools without informing them so that we can see all the gaps on the spot. We have given them our observations, and we are hoping for them to improve on them.
“Generally speaking, the state is very keen, and the farmer governor is very keen on improving our health institutions. That is one of the reasons why we felt that without informing them, we could give that on-the-spot assessment on the ways to improve.
“They need a lot of improvement, and they also need support because it is really a capital-intensive project. Even where some of them are located, I wonder where they got their approval. The government can not do it all. They have to look here and there for support, but we intend to take their present state of operations very seriously.
“That is why we went to assess them. Not everybody who has the license to open a health school should be allowed to open such a school. I have been here now for around four months, and I am yet to familiarise myself with all the schools. So, these ones around us are just looking at them to see how we can advise the government on how best to assist them and upgrade their standards and also regulate the healthcare sector. The ministry itself is trying to improve on what we have in place and on their standards,” Said told Arewa PUNCH.