Inuwa Yahaya, Other Governors Commit To Increase Primary Health Care Funding
By Ben Ngwakwe, Gombe
Gombe State Governor, Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya, on Wednesday attended the official launching of the Primary Health Care Leadership Challenge Fund Project held at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa in Abuja.
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The high level engagement was organised by the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) in collaboration with the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA), UNICEF and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF).
In the statement made available to newsmen in Gombe by the Director-General Press Affairs Government House, stated that Governor Inuwa Yahaya and his colleagues under the auspices of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum, NGF, the Ministers of FCT and Health, the Sultan of Sokoto and the President of CAN, Leadership of the Gates Foundation, President of the Aliko Dangote Foundation, Heads of multi-lateral and bilateral agencies and implementing partners in Nigeria witnessed the launch.
The Governors, after the launch, made a statement of commitment to strengthening primary health care system in their respective states, through improving the governance of the PHC as a sub national level by fully implementing the primary health care under one roof policy.
Governor Inuwa and his colleagues have also undertaken to promote progressive increase in primary health care funding by ensuring efficient budgeting that is aligned to annual operational plans, promptly releasing approved budget to the state primary health care board, and primary health care facilities.
The PHC Leadership Challenge fund aims at incentivising high-level oversight and accountability at the level of the Executive Governors to propel States to build public health capacities for evidence-based planning and monitoring, with long term sustainability by periodically tracking progress towards implementing the Seattle Declaration.
Under the programme, progress will be tracked using an agreed set of indicators and states who meet these indicators will be awarded accordingly. This novel project is seen by critical stakeholders as a likely game changer in the collective drive to revitalise and strengthen the PHC system with the aim of bringing the states an edge closer to achieving universal health coverage in Nigeria.
