COVID 19: APC chieftain challenges civil society, labour unions, academia on voluntary service initiatives

A chieftain of the All Progressivea Congress (APC), Salihu Lukman has called on different segments of the Nigerian society to take proactive voluntary service initiatives toward complementing efforts of governments at all levels in curtailing the spread of coronavirus.

Lukman, who is the Director General of the Progressive Governors Forum lamented citizen’s mindset that the Covid-19 challenge is a problem that government must address.

He knocked leaders of civil society organisations, labour and trade unions , the academia and political figures for failing to make meaningful contributions towards onslaught against the virus.

The party chieftain appealled to every person resident in Nigeria, both Nigerians and non-Nigerians, that tackling the challenge of Covid-19 require very good synergy of initiatives between government and citizens.

According to him, the challenge posed by the pandemic goes beyond infrastructural capacities such as hospitals, doctors, medical personnel, drugs, equipment, etc, but the need for citizens to demonstrate commitment to contribute to the fight against Covid-19 through clear actions, recommendations and initiatives to mobilise themselves to also play their roles.

Lukman in a statement on Friday while commending efforts by government and public spirited induviduals for their initiatives so far, he said more could be done by the civil society and organised labour in complementing efforts by others.

He said “Maybe it needs to be stated unambiguously, the fight against Covid-19, from all the evidences will only be won by combinations of governments’ and citizens’ initiatives.

“Unfortunately, citizens have predominantly reduced their support or engagement towards tackling the challenges of Covid-19 to issuing statements either in response or expectation of what government should do.

“Where are our civil society leaders with all the claimed selfless services and international networks around issues of health and welfare services?

“This is the time to showcase those competencies and networks by joining all the taskforces setup by the federal and state governments to mobilise complimentary initiatives.

“Those complimentary initiatives are needed to strengthen capacity of governments to regulate provisions in our hospitals to meet WHO standards starting with procuring the right equipment to the provision of spaces for treating patients who have tested positive.

“Take the case of contact tracing, which the Minister of Health announced that efforts are still being made to trace more than 4,000 contacts. Imagine our leaders of non-governmetal organisations supporting government in the effort for contact tracing.

“Certainly, there could more success and speed in tracing the contacts and therefore minimising the spread of the virus in the country. This is what will be required to strengthen national capacity to control spread of the virus and cure positive cases.

The Director General said inspite of the enormity of the Covid-19 challenge, NCDC, team of medical personnel, Federal and State governments are doing excellently well to have so far kept death arising from Covid-19 in Nigeria to 1 out of 65 while he also appreciated financial assistance given by corporate community and wealthy Nigerians described as impressively rising to this challenge.

READ ALSO: COVID-19: Aregbesola seeks immediate decongestion of correctional centres

Further challenging civil society groups, other segments of the society and the general citizenry on their expected roles, Lukman said “in the same spirit of accountability during elections when we have civil society organisations setting up situation rooms and issuing out daily or periodic reports around initiatives to guarantee free and fair elections, is it not possible to also have civil society Covid-19 situation rooms located across the country and releasing reports about initiatives and progress towards supporting our governments in this direction?

“This way, it will not just be the voices of government officials on what is being done to combat Covid-19 in Nigeria but also that of citizens. This is one area where the leadership of National Orientation Agency (NOA) should demonstrate some competence and capabilities to mobilise Nigeria’s non-state actors to commit themselves to the national effort to combat Covid-19.

“The other issue is the question of enforcing social distancing and lockdown. With a very active labour movement that is very good and efficient in organising strikes, most times against very hostile security operatives, one would have thought this is one area that our NLC, TUC and all union and civil society leaders could volunteer their support. This is hardly the case.

“Our union leaders should join government to work out strategies to enforce social distancing and lockdowns. This should be even in the strategic interest of workers because during and after the Covid-19 battle, there will be the issue of how employers including governments are able to mobilise financial resources to pay salaries.

” Workers and their union leadership need to make some strategic social and moral investments ahead of the post Covid-19 labour relations challenges already brewing.

“It is quite disturbing that our public conversation around Covid-19 tend to miss out on a number of these issues. Otherwise, why should our university lecturers be on strike at this critical moment.

Even some sections of medical doctors were on strike in parts of the country until Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) directed them to call off the strike some few days ago.

” If university lecturers are on strike at this time, including lecturers in faculties of medicine and possibly university teaching hospitals, it simply means our universities and teaching hospitals are not part of efforts by governments’ initiatives to fight Covid-19. This is quite scandalous and to say the least disturbing.

“We may also decide to ignore the fact that ASUU is an affiliate of NLC and at least two other affiliates of NLC operate in the health sector. These are Medical and Health Workers and Nurses and Midwives. In fact, the President of NLC, Comrade Ayuba Wabba is a Medical worker.

“How is NLC and its leadership, given their vantage influences in the nation’s health sector applying themselves to engage Nigerian government to ensure strong capacity to win the Covid-19 battle? It may be too early to say whether it is a question of volunteering initiatives or that of evaluating government’s initiative.

“Covid-19 require that we all come back to our senses by coming up with voluntary initiatives. We don’t have the luxury we think we have to just sit down and condemn our governments”

Lukman said governments , civil society and union leaders and members will be as vulnerable as any ordinary citizen.

“The time to act is now. We don’t have the luxury of imagining that this is a problem for government. It is a problem for everyone!”, he said.