Post-Coronavirus Pandemic Changes Nigeria Cannot Defer
Kule Abel
Abuja
According to Bryan Walsh in his article published on BBC Future on 26th March, 2020 “The number of new infectious diseases like SARS, HIV and Covid-19 has increased by nearly fourfold over the past century.” This fact is a sad reminder of how vulnerable the human race remains and the fact that pandemics are still a global threat. The thesis of this exposeʹ is not how we as a nation can avoid similar pandemics in the future, but changes the country must undergo to better manage and combat future pandemics such as the covid-19 that we are presently contending with. These changes will not only help us manage future pandemics but also improve the quality of life in the country generally. These changes cut across different sectors of the society and together they will impact every facet of our lives as Nigerians.
Improved Health Care System
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation’s declaration of ignorance on the poor state of the nation’s health facilities and system on the 9th of April, 2020 though laughable and bottom-line hypocritical, proves that the Covid-19 pandemic has once again exposed the poor state of the nation’s health care system to the helpless Nigerians who already knew and the elite who may feign ignorance. Forgetting that ignorance is not an excuse in the Nigerian courts of law neither is it an excuse in the hearts of the poor innocent victims who have been
At least now that our leaders and their high society are feeling the brunt of our poor health system, they must improve the health care system in terms of; better facilities, health equipments, expert and professional health personnel, and accessible and affordable health care for the poor masses.
Functional Data and Surveillance System
The fight against Covid-19 pandemic has given rise to decisions like; contact tracing, social/physical distancing, lockdown of public and private institutions, awareness campaigns, setting guidelines for health professionals, targeting infection clusters and allocation of scarce resources. According to Rotsitsa Zaimova, an Associate Partner at Dalberg Data Insights (DDI), “These decisions will influence how many people will survive and how many will die over the coming days, weeks and months.”
One basis for these decisions is the availability of the right data. The availability of quality data and surveillance on the population mobility, and the spread of the disease can help public health and humanitarian leaders respond more effectively to the pandemic. Also, quality data is very important in the distribution of palliatives rolled out by the government and other donors to cushion the effect of the economic lockdown on the populace.
The big question that begs to be answered now is, “Do we have these data?” Sadly, the answer is no. Apart from voters register, we lack data on; total number of births in the country, total number of deaths in the country, total number of citizens with access to health care, total number of citizens without access to health care, total number of unemployed citizens, total number of employed citizens, total number of migrants, total number of schooling students, total number of students out of school, just to many but a few. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organization says, “You cannot fight a fire blindfolded.” Not having the right information in a time of crisis is indeed like fighting a fire blindfolded. Nigeria cannot afford to defer collation of data on every aspect and sector of the Nigerian society. The available data, if any is just not enough.
Upgraded Educational System
It is truism to reiterate the fact that the quality of public education served across the different levels of education in the country is of very low standard. Education is the bedrock of every society and must be served to the learners in it highest quality, through a well-structured educational programme. Not the type that is served in run-down, ill-equipped schools, using apathetic, unfit, underpaid teachers. Through educational programmes that are fraught with strikes and a lot of malpractices.
Presently, all learners in the different public schools in the country, be it primary, secondary or tertiary institutions are at home. In other words the educational sector is on shutdown just like many other public institutions. However, learners whose parents can afford private education are learning through online platforms made available by their expensive private schools, while their contemporaries in public institutions are losing valuable time. Our public educational institutions across board will need to be upgraded in terms of facilities and teacher training, to better position them for the innumerable benefits of E- learning.
On another note, scientists in universities and colleges in Asia, Europe and America are working assiduously to make vaccine and develop a cure for the corona virus, and end the pandemic. Presuming that the scientists in our Nigerian public universities are doing the same would be confusing ignorance with a mistake. If you care to ask why, they will lecture you on how their laboratories are not equipped, and there are no research grants or funding. Just like the leaders they love to criticize, they seem to have lost their passion for research, inventions and impacting their communities. Instead, they have acquired new taste in competing for wages with senators and governors, unprofessionalism and arm-chair criticism.
Post-Covid 19 Nigerian society, must witness an upgrade in our primary, secondary and tertiary institutions, if not, when another crisis of this magnitude befalls us again, we will be “twice beaten and not shy.”
The Trust Deficit between the Leaders and the Led
Nigerians do not trust their leaders. The ones they voted genuinely and the ones with stolen mandates. I must say the leaders have not done much to earn the people’s trust anyway. Apart from failure on the part of the leaders to provided social amenities, create jobs, provide access to quality health care and quality education among a long list of so many other failures, the different regimes over the years have embarked on large scale corruption with flagrant impunity. This has engendered a high sense of distrust in the populace.
The leadership of the country has also promoted tribal and ethno-centric sentiments within the citizenry while fostering divides along religious lines. These tribal, religious and ethnic sentiments engraved in the hearts of the masses coupled with the disillusionment arising from the failure of leadership have led to the distrustful habit of birthing conspiracy theories whenever government rolls out her policies for development, or give press releases on issues such as the casualty numbers in the Boko Haram fight, the distribution of palliatives by the government and the judicious of donations made by individuals and corporate organizations. It is so bad that some people think their state governments are lying about the Coronavirus cases in their states just to benefit from the stimulus packages from the federal government.
On the contrary, the ignorance of a large number of the masses concerning government policies and procedures has contributed greatly to the distrust between the government and her people. If only they were well educated and informed, they would be more trusting of the government’s spokesman, Lai Mohammed and not think that the words Lai and lie are synonymous even though they rhyme. The large gap of distrust between the leaders and the led has to the closed. In other words, they government has to do more to earn the people’s trust. They must deliver on their promises for the people to give them the benefit of the doubt. The masses must educate themselves on the peculiarities of the prevailing conditions that inform government policies and the implementation process. The government and the masses must work towards a mutual trust project.
We must all agree that the list above is not exhaustive. However, these are some of the issues that have been exposed as a result of the corona virus pandemic. They are some of the key takeaways from the pandemic we simply cannot afford to ignore. Harrowing experiences such as these always serve as a wake-up call, and I strongly pray the Nigerian government and Nigerian people will heed this wake-up call. A change in the post-Covid-19 Nigerian society is imperative and not deferrable. We simply cannot go back to business as usual.
