‘Doctors can leave’ comment: Although misquoted, I stand by my words – Ngige

Ukpono Ukpong, Abuja

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Sen. Chris Ngige, has clarified his position on the issue of international migration by Nigerian Medical Doctors as contained in his interview on Channels Television live morning programme on Wednesday, April 24, 2019 which has been subjected to serial distortion and misinterpretation, arising from skewed news broadcast by the Channels media team.

He described the incident as well as the selective reportage which it fuelled in the media as unnecessary, calling for a deeper understanding of the issue in question.

A statement by the Special Assistant Media to the Minister, Nwachukwu Obidiwe, said Sen. Ngige being a patriotic Nigerian, a medical doctor, and one who neither shies away from speaking on the reality of the Nigerian situation nor given to pretences, fully appreciates the sensitivity of the issue at hand and the consequential negative import of brain drain on national productivity.

“I speak from the vintage position of being a medical doctor and member, Nigerian Medical Association since June, 1979 and enriched by my vast knowledge on health administration, having retired as a Deputy Director, Medical Services and Training from the Federal Ministry of Health in 1998, member of Vision 2010 Committee on Health as well as senior member, Senate Committee on Health 2011-2015.

“Therefore, the truth no matter how it hurts, must be told and reality, boldly faced.

Hence, apart from Nigeria’s non-compliance with the World Health Organisation’s ratio of one doctor to six hundred patients of which I was misquoted, every other thing I said in that interview is an existential reality, useful and constructive facts which every Nigerian that watched the full interview will hardly dispute.

I invite opinion moulders especially those who have spoken or written on this issue to watch the full clip of my interview with the channels.

“And it is for this reason that I admitted having a little cause to worry about brain drain among medical doctors.

The fact is that while the federal government has recorded a remarkably steady improvement in our healthcare system, Nigeria is yet to get there.

We do not at present have enough health facilities to accommodate all the doctors seeking to do tertiary specialist training (residency) in the Teaching Hospitals, Federal Medical Centres and few accredited state and private specialist centres in the country, where roughly 20% of the yearly applicants are absorbed while the remaining 80%, try their luck elsewhere.”

According to the statement, most of these rejected applicants usually throng the Federal Ministry of Health and that of Labour and Employment to complain of being illegally schemed out.

“What the Minister meant therefore is that these professionals have the right to seek for training abroad to sharpen their skills, become specialists and later turn this problem to a national advantage when they repatriate their legitimate earnings and later return to the country.

“Even where some of these doctors are bonded to their oversea training institutions, examples abound on the large number of them who have successfully returned to settle and establish specialist centres across the country.

It is therefore a question of turning your handicap to an advantage,” the statement concluded.