Pate asserts that the autonomy of LG represents a crucial milestone in the development of Nigeria’s healthcare system.
.jpeg)
Pate said this on Monday in Abuja on the sidelines of the
Inaugural Quarterly Performance Dialogue with States Commissioners of Health.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that on July 11,
the Supreme Court held that henceforth, all Local Government Area allocations
should be paid directly into their accounts.
The Attorney General of the Federation, Lateef Fgebemi, SAN
had on May 24 on behalf of the Federal Government dragged the 36 governors
before the Supreme Court over alleged misconduct in the running of affairs of
local governments in the country.
The Attorney General instituted the court action against the
governors primarily seeking full autonomy for local governments as third tiers
of government in the country.
Pate said that LG autonomy was an opportunity to galvanise
all levels of government to put healthcare delivery in one direction.
According to him, having all levels of government in one
direction will ensure that healthcare is delivered using a ring fenced fund.
“This fund will be managed by the state but with an
agreement of the local governments to implement fully the Primary Health Care
(PHC) under one roof.”
He said that in that position, the local governments are
closer to the people and the states are close to the local government, while
the Federal Government is close to all of the arms of government.
Going down memory lane, he said that prior to 2011, the
responsibility of PHC was highly fragmented between the states and it was
really a challenge as performance generally was low.
“That presentation resulted in poor performance across
different elements including immunisation, maternal health outcomes, and
several other things.
“To reduce the fragmentation, the National Council of Health
(NCH) in 2011, approved the PHC under one roof, which accelerated the creation
of State PHC delivery agencies at that time as a way to bring Federal
Government, states and LGAs together.”
The minister said that not only the Federal Government, but
states were key parts of the national health system and that the LG system by
law was part of the system too.
“So we are all operating in the context of cooperative
federalism where all hands are on deck and our development partners have joined
in that and we have raised grant resources to provide incentives to the states
to contribute their counterparts.
“With this development, even LGs will be required to step up
and we will measure each other’s performance and Nigerians should be able to
tell which state, which LG is doing its part.”
He, however, said that the judgment was tilting the
authorities towards the point where they begin to find ways to work together to
govern a complex health system that has different levels of responsibility.
“So how does each level do what it needs to do and be held
accountable and respond to the needs of Nigerians?
“So long as we look at ourselves as serving Nigerian people,
and we behave in the right way, I think we will see that the health system will
be maturing over time.”
Pate reiterated the Federal Government committed to do all
it would take to see that the health of mothers, children and the most
vulnerable in society continued to improve. NAN