Group Tasks Gombe state government on Women and Children health.
The country director Evidence for Action MamaYe Dr. Tunde Segun, has called for an increase in government participation in the health sector of the state. Dr. Segun, made this call at a one day Scorecard workshop held to appraise activities he said .”let these partnerships continue, let civil society organizations come together to form the watch dog because government can’t write the question, participate in the examination and still be the one to score it. “So GoSAM as a state Accountability mechanism for Maternal newborn and Child health, looks closely at everything that concerns Mothers, New borns and adolescents through tracking indicators on Family planning, health. “The current Governor Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya, is at advantage because in the last 3years we have supported Gombe state in all these issues I had mentioned.”it is now left for GoSAM advocates to ensure the Governor understands all that has been happening and to understand his commitment because the Bill and Melinda Gate had a previous Memorandum of Understanding with the previous administration. Then GoSAM can now advocate that each secondary facility has a functional blood bank. They now have result and proofs of things to show him. I hereby call on Governor Inuwa, to build on what has been done for instance health insurance scheme. “it should be about the people and not about PDP or APC. “Issues on health should be viewed from less from the political lens and more from the people lens. “Even though we say health should be a political issue because if it is not it won’t have the needed attention of the politicians but it should never be politicised. That way the Governor can do what the advocates had said within the arm bit of the law, and resources available to you. Some people claim heath can not be seen, unlike when we build roads, but if your people are not in health, how do you expect to build.
Fola Adewusi, Senior Advocacy Advisor Evidence for Action MamaYe, noted that there is a current capacity for GoSAM to thrive she said “We have built the capacity of GoSAM to be able to take on Evidence based advocacy and from the various presentations, it is clear that it not lacking . “That is what they need to sustain the CSO’s, Professional bodies, they have been together for these number of years, so they should sustain it. “There is a change of government, so they should wake up now and begin to engage. “They have all the tools, to say this is what this platform has been able to do and these are the changes we expect, like prioritizing health of women and children. “Fortunately, in the heat of the campaign GoSAM was one of the CSO group that engaged the candidates and political parties on health. “Promises were made all they need to do is to hold government accountable to their promises. “A lot still needs to be done, with constant engagement of those that matters. “It is not enough for there to be allocation, it is Release that matters, that is where CSO’s will come in to ensure it is well utilized. “It is a gradual process if this year housing of medical personnel’s are taken care of and next year blood bank issue is totally resolved. The year to come they won’t appear again , then you can face other issues. A lot has been done, good thing GoSAM has done by providing evidence in a user friendly manner should be sustained.
Meanwhile, Sheye Ibrahim, the state coordinator of MamaYe in Gombe state stressed the need for continuous performance in the state healthcare delivery. “we operate from the angle of Evidence, Accountability for Maternal and new born health and the way we have piloted it has been through dialogue under the state led Accountability mechanism, where we look at various indicators and track progress or otherwise in a very acceptable format which is our scorecard. “We have done budget advocacy and so on.
Participants cut across CSo’s, journalists and civil servants who had come to get the scorecard on maternal and new born health
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