Appoint Nurses Into Your Cabinet, NANNM Tells Tinubu

The National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives (NANNM) has appealed to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to appoint nurses into his government in ministerial positions, personal assistants, and special assistants.

It also expressed dissatisfaction over the alleged neglect of nurses in the ministerial nominations of President Bola Tinubu, adding that there was no single nurse on the list and does not go down well with the association.

Chairman of NANNM, FCT Chapter, Deborah Yusuf, made the appeal while speaking with journalists on the sidelines of the opening ceremony of the 2023 annual FCT nurses’ week/scientific workshop with the theme “Our Nurses of the Future,” held in Abuja yesterday.

According to her, nurses were relegated to the background, and she wondered if there were no nurses to represent the profession in the president’s cabinet.

“We are not happy with this situation; we are appealing to President Tinubu to look into that.

“We have so many nurses with good qualifications that can stand the test of time; the government should be fair in whatever it is doing. All other professionals are accommodated on the list, but there is no nurse.”

Speaking further, Deborah said nurses are the backbone of any healthcare system, as they provide professional and compassionate care, support, and guidance to patients and their families both inside and outside the hospital.

In these difficult times, our nurses have been frontline heroes battling pandemics and the healthcare system crisis in Nigeria.

“The system remains plagued by the ‘Japa’ syndrome. Nurses are facing push factors such as understaffing of healthcare professionals in hospitals, emotional exhaustion, poor staff welfare, and safety.

“Nonetheless, our dedication and willpower have remained solid. We selflessly face high risks and occupational hazards to safeguard lives and protect communities.

In his earlier remarks, the Registrar Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria, Dr. Faruk Umar Abubakar, explained that migration of nurses can be of merit to the source country in terms of foreign remittance.

“The demerits outweigh the benefits, as educational infrastructures of the source countries are leveraged to train nurses who later do not serve in the country that trained and needs them.

“Therefore, it is very imperative that the government adopts appropriate measures through good policy-making and implementation to prevent push factors that result in or trigger the migration of Nigerian nurses to developed countries,” he said.