AN ADDRESS BY CHIEF (HON.) NURSE SOLOMON
E.O. EGWUENU FNHR, FCAI, THE NATIONAL PRESIDENT OF UNIVERSITY GRADUATES OF
NURSING SCIENCES ASSOCIATION (UGONSA) ON THE OCCASSIONOF EXPANDED NATIONAL STAKEHOLDERS
MEETING HELD AT
CABRINI CENTRE, NEAR
FEDERAL NEUROPSYCHIATRIC HOSPITAL, ENUGU, ENUGU STATE ON SATURDAY JUNE 3RD,
2017.
Professional colleagues, I wish to most
sincerely welcome all of you to this historical gathering of the present and
future torch bearers of Nigerian “DREAM NURSING PROFESSION”. May I at this
point appreciate, honour and praise the Almighty God for granting us all
journey mercies from our different destinations to Enugu, the coal city, for
this epoch making gathering.
I
must not fail to appreciate and pay worthy and deserved tributes to you all,
the industrious and progressive nurses that have made all our struggles and
efforts in liberating the Nigerian Graduates Nurses not only fruitful but
worthwhile and efficacious. Even when I was incapacitated by ailment the struggle
continued strongly in my absence. I cannot thank you enough!
When
I cast my mind back and reflect through the memory lane from the time few
Nurses gladiators stood firm and resuscitated our ailing Graduates Nurses
Association of Nigeria (GNAN) through to the official registration of GNAN as
UGONSA, and the protracted struggles that preceded our realization of
internship training programme for our fresh graduates, we surely have much
cause to glorify the Lord for the journey so far.
However,
my beloved professional colleagues - there is so much work to do as there are
so many intrinsic and extrinsic, intra-professional and inter-professional
forces and detractors out to negate our aspirations and impede our growth and
development. This gloomy situation notwithstanding, we must appreciate the
spiritual and psycho-social fact that one with God is not only a majority but
irrepressible. Our mission and cause are just and our struggles and desires are
divinely guided.
The
main goal of UGONSA is essentially that the Nigerian Graduates of Nursing
Sciences must be given their place of pride like their contemporaries in the
western world. It is today not only real but a fact that Rear Admiral Sylvia
Trent-Adams is the Surgeon General of the United States of America. It is also
a fact that this is not the first time a nurse in the United States is
occupying such an exalted position. Before her, there has been a
Nurse-Physician Surgeon General, Dr Richard Carmona, who preferred his identity
as a Nurse.
Today
in Nigeria, there is an unhealthy monopoly and professional oppression in our
health system. This situation has promoted mediocrity over meritocracy and has
stunted the growth and development of our healthcare services. It has equally
incapacitated inter-disciplinary co-operation and mutual knowledge sharing and
research for clinical practice and education that leaves our health system in a
despicable situation.
There
is no doubt, professional colleagues – that the problems’ facing nursing and
the healthcare system in Nigeria is like an Augen stable, which would be
difficult to clear. However, when the immediate past President of the United
States, Barrack Obama, embarked on the journey of the becoming the President of
America, a seemingly impossible post for a “Blackman”, he made the world to
appreciate the two words phrase “WE CAN”. We all should draw our strength from
this phrase “WE CAN” for I surely know and believe that truly “WE CAN”. It is
in the light of this that I draw our attention to the enormous tasks ahead.
I
have earlier emphasized the fact that there is so much to be done to take
nursing to its proper place of pride and the Graduates of Nursing Science to
the pilot’s seat of not only the health system but the country in general. May
I therefore agitate our minds a little bit by raising the following questions:
the provost of a college of Health Sciences?
b. When shall a graduate of Nursing Science serve this nation as the substantive (Federal)
Minister of health?
c. When shall a professor of Nursing become the Vice Chancellor of any of the Nigerian
universities?
d. When
will the Graduate Nurse be the chairman of a Board or Governing Council of a
Federal University Teaching Hospital?
e. When
shall a Graduate Nurse become the Chairman of a State Hospital Management
Board?
f. When
shall a Graduate Nurse head a State or Federal parastatal or MDA?
g. How
much are the nurses or the graduate nurses involved in policy formulation and
implementation in our health system, even on issues that concern us?
h. When
shall nursing practice, education and administration be freed from the
hegemonic grip of Chief Medical Directors?
i. When shall the deliberate
marginalization, and ridiculing of the nurses and nursing
profession by the
“powers that be” be brought to an end and made actionable and punishable in
law?
j. When shall “news writers” and “movie
producers” stop their ferocious unprovoked
onslaught on the public image of
nursing, which they have penchant for projecting in bad light?
k. When
shall the nursing profession be represented by its first eleven, under the
umbrella of a worthy, respected and reputable professional association?
The
questions seem endless and just but a few of the areas that require prompt,
purposeful and effective result- oriented attention were merely highlighted.
I
raised these issues to agitate our minds and stimulate critical thinking and
reasoning for proactive and conscious actions because I have no fear in my mind
that UGONSA has the human resources that would surely make the positive changes
and help guide nursing to its place of pride and respectability in Nigeria.
Once more, may I appreciate you all for your contributions and tenacity. May I
finally say kudos to our able National Secretary, Nurse Nshi Goodluck. He is
indeed an indefatigable torch bearer, and a man with medas touch. May God
continue to bless you all!
Thank
you!! Long live UGONSA!!!
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