Commissioners of health from the 36 states of the federation in their ongoing meeting in Abuja seek common solutions to solve operational challenges facing health sector in Nigeria.
The Forum said there was a need for these stakeholders to work together and align themselves with corporate vision to deal with the issues for the benefit of the states.
The Nigeria Health Commissioners Forum (NHCF) which was organised in collaboration with the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF), had in attendance the Executive Secretary of States Primary Health Care Development Agency (SPHCDA) and Head of Insurance agencies.
The Chairman of the NHCF, Dr Oyebanji Filani explained that there was a need for stakeholders to work together and align themselves with corporate vision to deal with the issues for the benefit of the states.
Filani disclosed that the gathering of like-minds was for the first time ever, and that the goal was to ensure they are able to work as inter-disciplinary agencies on health issues.
He said that the theme of the meeting tagged “top team effectiveness retreat” was adopted because governance and leadership were key components to the development of the health sector.
According to Filani: “we are able to get the leaders of different agencies to align themselves and ensure that different officers, directorate and programme officers are put to work in accordance to lay down rules to achieve a common vision, things will work.
“To do this kind of programme, it is important we have a clear idea of what the problem is, understand the roles, processes, goals and interdisciplinary engagement to tackle this problem across board.
“We had already carried out research on some of these challenges, we have sat down to review some of the findings and profers solutions on them.
“This retreat will focus on looking at the findings and agree jointly, and ensure there is a clear alignment as well as pure engagement across board,” Filani said.
He said that commissioners and other health executives would continue to encourage people at the state level to take proactive action against COVID-19.
The Commissioner of Health and Human Services, Borno State, Prof Mohammed Alhaji, called for focus, collaboration and integration of health programmes among health stakeholders within states
He said that every health stakeholder in the states must work as a team, nothing that the research carried out by the NGF and commissioners’ research team had identified a lack of coordination between health officers in the states.
Also, the Executive Secretary of Kano State Contributory Healthcare Management Agency, Dr Halima Mijinyawa, further emphasised on the need to achieve a common goal among all health stakeholders in the states.
Minjiyawa maintained that there was a need to look at the communication gaps and find a possible solution to it for the benefit of the health sector in the states.
Meanwhile, the Director-General of the NGF Secretariat, Asishana Okauru, reiterated that effective leadership of the health MDAs at the sub-national level was a critical ingredient for the attainment of the vision of the NGF.
Okauru said the initiative relates to the quest to achieve Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and Sustainable Development Goal three (3).
“As you are aware, the NGF launched the PHC leadership challenge fund in August 2022 as part of its commitment to strengthen PHC system at the subnational level, which is a key gateway to achieving UHC in the country.
“This leadership challenge requires that the leaders of the health MDAs in each of the state work collaboratively and harmoniously towards the common goal of ensuring that every citizen has access to the health they need without financial difficulty,” he added.
