Ufomba Uzuegbu
10 November 2008
Lagos — BAUCHI State government has sponsored 23 female adolescents for medical training in Egypt.
The move is part of government's efforts at promoting girl-child education and also towards eliminating cultural and religious practices against women which hinder most women from attending hospitals in the state.
The governor, Mallam Isa Yuguda who stated these while bidding them farewell on wednesday said they would be studing Gynecology in Egypt with the aim of coming back to serve the state.
The 23 students left Nigeria on Wednesday night and are expected to resume next week at the AIN SHAMS University in Cairo, Egypt for the study.
The 23 prospective doctors each representing a local government area were selected in a process of clear academic exercise.
Governor Isa Yuguda told the beneficiaries of the gesture that his administrations' policies are carefully conceived and implemented to improve the lives of the majority of the people and "serve as a springboard for other disadvantaged states of northern Nigeria."
He said the programme was especially designed to bridge the gap between male and female indigenes who study medical sciences in the state and raise the standard of health care service delivery in the state "making Bauchi the only state that will have enough female doctors to attend to the needs of female patients in Nigeria".
The Governor expressed confidence that "given the competitive nature of the selection process of the students and the high academic performance" they presented, "Bauchi will be proud of them on graduation".
He urged them to be good ambassadors of the state and the country "since your conduct, behaviour and performance will determine the acceptance of this programme by our people".
Malam Isa Yuguda lamented that past administrations in the state have neglected that critical sector resulting in apathy and low attendance of women to hospital which his administration is poised to reverse.
He assured that the result of the female medical doctors programme will germinate at a time when Bauchi "Teaching Hospital and Medical College would have fully taken off", paving way for them to contribute maximally and improve their capacities within the state.
Commissioner for higher education in the state, Alhaji Bala Jibrin noted that parents of the prospective doctors do not have to pay anything as the government had paid everything for them including pocket money and subsistence allowances.
While commending the Yuguda administration for initiating such laudable programmes on behalf of the 23 female students, Habiba Dadan Garba revealed that parents of most of them could not afford to send them to even Nigeria universities, but "the Malam Isa Yuguda administration has made possible for Talakawas not only to be educated but abroad".
The spokesperson for the students also assured the governor that they will not disappoint the state government for "this huge investment on us", saying they hope to come back and "meet Malam in his second term so that you feel fulfilled that your government policies have changed the lives of the people of the state."
Similarly about 120 student doctors and 25 others studying physiotherapy and radiography of Bauchi State extraction who are at various levels of medical training in Nigerian universities are being provided with requisite support by the state government that are bonded under a programme that places them on monthly salaries and allowances to ease their studies and ensure that at the end of the training they come back and serve the state.
Bauchi State presently has a shortage of gyneacologists in the state hospitals. Hence, the overseas training is intended to bridge the gap between female doctors who attend to female patients in the state.
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