BY CHIMA NWAFO
The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) has approved additional tax with greater
impact on the lower income group hit harder by the crippling effects of the coronavirus,
which infection and fatality rates are rising even as medical workers express concern
over the inability of government to contain the ravaging pandemic. But the Federal
Government’s reaction to the plight of the frontline workers articulated during the
warning strike ofthe National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) does not show
sufficient understanding of the potential danger of the long neglected health delivery
system.
On the state of affairs in the distressing healthcare system and the tribulations of
medicalworkers, Adelaja Adeoye told The Guardian: “The poor working conditions
are part of
the reasons they usually abandon Nigeria to seek greener pastures abroad, and this
makes our health sector to suffer.”
A health expert noted: “Since the opening of interstate travels and increase in test
center, there has been significant daily rise in number of confirmed cases, admission and
death.The more the positive cases, the more the fix and makeshift facilities are
stretched,
so
also the available health workers. They, too, are human who must take care of their
health and so the absence of ideal or proper personal protective equipment (PPE) will
also hamper their response to work.”
This understanding seems to be lacking by both the federal and state
governments given their reaction to the demands of health workers and level of investment in the health-care sector. Elsewhere in the world, in addition to adequate healthcare
system,
governments improve the working conditions of medical staff, including provision of
quality protective personal equipment and other necessary facilities as well as reducing
their hours of work to reduce their level of exposure to infection.
In the United Kingdom, the Prime Minister leads the campaign to enlighten the
populace on need to protect the life of healthcare staff. Organisations and individuals
engage in fundraising to support health workers. Besides, there were stimulus
packages
and palliatives to all classes of workers, private and public, not only during the
lockdown but for as long as the pandemic lasts.
In the United States from where Nigeria borrowed the much abused Presidential
Constitution, the government has not only been providing cash palliatives and stimulus
packages, citizens are even asking for government support to private daycare centres
given the value they place on the life and quality early in upbringing of the child,
which determines their future as adult citizens. Meanwhile, the people
oriented US Congress
has already enacted CARES Act, passed in March, which provided $3.5 billion for
child care. That is not all. This subject is of so great importance to Americans that
Patrick
Sisson, a Los Angelesbased writer, did an elaborate cover story on it for
CityLab
newspaper of July 22 (Nigerians are quick to tell you that no one reads newspapers
any
longer,
ignoring the fundamental cause: Poverty and Blackman’s contempt for reading).
Among his findings:
“This week, presidential candidate Joe Biden made the crisis in the child care sector
the
focus of one of his campaign proposals for economic recovery, pledging $775
billion forcaregivers who are ‘underpaid, unseen and undervalued.’ Biden promises
the plan
would create 3 million new jobs in the industry in the next decade.
Elliot Haspel, a child care policy expert and author of Crawling Behind: America’s
Child Care Crisis and How to Fix It: ‘It’s now the end of July, and we haven’t seen
significant action at the federal level. We’re seeing highquality programs close their
doors permanently, which will impact our kids and the economy. It’s just a stunning
indictment of how we treat early childhood education in this country…. Before the
pandemic, 2 out of every 3 young children had all available parents and guardians
in the workforce, and 26.8 million U.S. workers are dependent on child care to work.’
‘A University of Oregon study chronicling the impact the Covid crisis is having on
families has found that by just about every measure health, stress, learning this
pandemicis ‘hammering’ lower-income families and families of color, Haspel added.
According to providers, researchers, and advocates, it’s no exaggeration to say that
without government investment and assistance from local sources, but most
importantly,
state and federal governments – the U.S. child care system as we know it may collapse. “Given the parallax nature of Nigerian politics, one is compelled to ask: Whose interest
is paramount in Nigerian politicians, irrespective partisan affiliations? The answer is not farfetched.
A close look at the take home package and terminal benefits of political
office holders and legislators from local council to the Presidency will provide the answer. As
stated earlier, while humane nations are concerned about the survival of their citizens
from this deadly global pandemic, the government of Nigeria is doing everything to
enhance hardship and poverty as well as expose the populace to greater danger.
How do you explain a situation where you hear of palliatives and propaganda driven
economic stimulus packages but you never see someone you know, a relation,
colleague or course mate who received one?
From The Nation of Sunday July 26: “With the shutdown of schools in late March,
2020 following the incursion of COVID-19 into the country, school owners,
teaching
and
non teaching staff, as well as allied stakeholders have been without revenue or income,
leading to starvation, hypertension and even death for some. Imagine coming home to
meet one of your more dedicated teaching staff, waiting patiently at your gate with her
three children? A hungry and pitiable sight!” Multiply this by the number of private
schools in 774 LGAs nationwide.
As if that is not enough in an economy where the currency is losing value per day,
the government raised VAT so expansively that every item you consume, including the naira-guzzling phone calls and text messages are VATed. To add to the burden, struggling and
impoverished Nigerian urban dwellers who bear the brunt of the other taxes and levies, are now,
by
the recent order of the FIRS are to cough out 6 per cent of their rents as
stamp duty to a government that cannot give account of trillions of naira earnings and
donations from multilateral and donor agencies. According to FIRS, “the burden of
payment of the 6 per cent lies on the beneficiary of the tenancy or lease agreement,
whom the Stamp Duty Act identified as the tenant or renter.” Ordinarily or in the past
when
the country had stamps, it’s the issuer of receipt and not receiver that pays for the
stamp or affixes the stamp which is usually of a lower unit. But this is Progressives’
administration, a sentence to insouciance.
That explains why in other climes with optimal employment rate, high per capita
incomeand credible social nets, healthcare delivery is still given premier attention,
but not so in Nigeria. Nothing explains this more lucidly than the uncaring reaction to
the two-week notice which the striking resident doctors issued when they suspended their
industrial action midJune. President of NARD, Dr Aliyu Sokombo, told The
Guardian:
“In fact,the first meeting they invited us to after we called off the strike on June 15 was on
Monday, July 20. They have not shown any seriousness, but we are determined to be
patient with them. Nigerians can see what we are going through.”
The Federal Government has not met 90 per cent of their demands even as they
suspended the strike “for the sake of the patients and to give government the
benefit of
the doubt.” Sokombo noted that the only demand the government has met was the
payment of hazard allowance for April and May, to only 11 out of 52 public health
institutions in the country, adding that the N9 billion released by the government was
to settle the hazard allowance of all health workers, not just that of resident doctors.
From media reports, it will be alarming to produce the figure of doctors and nurses
that
have either lost their lives or reportedly infected by the novel coronavirus in various
states of the federation. One of the most recent and equally alarming was from the
Federal Capital Territory, the seat of power, where members of the Presidential Task
Force were also reported to be alarmed by the rate of infection.
Meanwhile, President of the parent body for all medical doctors, the Nigerian Medical
Association (NMA), Prof. Innocent Ujah, commended NARD for suspending the strike
despite most of their demands not being met, saying: “Already, our health system is
weak and we do not want anything to jeopardise some of the progress we are making,
especially on polio elimination from Nigeria and in containing COVID-19.”
Well, that is his opinion and concern. Notwithstanding, the figures keep rising.
Confirmed data for the weekend: 39,977 (infections); 16,948 (recovered) and 856
(deaths). But as if to confirm the German proverb that fish starts rotting from the head,
the President’s man at the helm, Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire, failed to pick
calls or reply to questions sent to him by The Guardian’s Health reporter regarding
efforts
to meet the resident doctors’ demands.Given this nonchalance, News Express reported
Sunday that NARD’s president, on Saturday, said the association will resume its
suspended nationwide strike in three weeks if the Federal Government fails to meet
its demands. That spells more deaths.
*Nwafo, Consulting Editor, News Express/Environmental Analyst, can be reached on:
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