When the Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID) a private sector-led initiative was established to assist the government in combating the Coronavirus disease in the country, the Public Health community lauded the initiative because it was a noble idea.
However, according to a statement by the Executive Director of Public Health Nigeria, Dr. Oche Joseph Otorkpa the events of the past 24 Hours has clearly shown that the Organization has lost focus in the midst of a second wave that has ravaged Africa and continues to take lives and destroy businesses across Nigeria.
The original purpose of the relief fund was to support the Federal government of Nigeria in containing the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria; to ensure patients get the care they need and frontline workers get essential supplies and equipment’s; and to accelerate efforts to provide tests. However this noble agenda has given way to ego tripping, foolish grand standing, politics and shameful malevolent conduct.
Why Nigerians are still recovering from the shock of how CACOVID donations and palliatives ended up in private pockets and warehouses which were re-looted during the ENDSARS crisis the organization has again entered the news for the wrong reasons.
According to him, we do not understand why an organization which claims to be in the forefront of the fight against the current pandemic will shamefully display its ignorance in the full glare of the public as it did yesterday against BUA a supportive member of the coalition.
The decision of BUA to help Nigeria secure 1 million doses of AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine via the AFREXIM vaccine platform should be commended by all citizens because failure do so would have meant that the opportunity to get those doses next week would have been lost as explained the CBN governor.
Instead to using its energy for disparaging its members, the CACOVID Leadership should be seen to be encouraging other members to tow the exemplary path of BUA and others who have taken bold steps in securing the lives of Nigerians especially the elderly and the vulnerable who continue to succumb daily to the pandemic.
”Let BUA take credit for what it has brought to the pool and others hiding under CACOVID to attack them should look inwards and put humanity and the lives of Nigerians above ego” he concluded. The statement also urged the National Primary Health Development Agency in charge of distributing the vaccine to learn from history and avoid the temptation of hoarding the vaccines or making it an exclusive preserve of the elite.
