My generation has had it very rough. We inherited a country overrun by decades of military rule and untold corruption, and majority of us adapted to surviving under unrelenting socioeconomic strain, early on.

Our economy, even at its finest, was always very bad. We have consistently had thoroughly incompetent leaders foisted on us through compromised, faulty electoral processes and continue to suffer the repercussions of years of extremely bad management decisions. Overwhelming structural imbalances that have stifled development and growth, produced distortions that suffused the polity with ethnic and religious conflicts have afflicted our society for so long, but my generation arguably suffered the brunt of it.

The hardship, our stark realities (which are even more dire now, in hindsight), never caused me to despair. Not even a little. I was always so enthusiastic; my middle name could very well have been ‘sunny optimism’. ENDSARS dampened that enthusiasm, but did not cause me to despair. But let me tell you why I have now grown extremely discouraged.

I will never understand people who show total disregard for the quality of healthcare. They annoy me plenty. One of our political leaders, an intellectually inferior man with a macabre sense of humour, recently opined (and I am paraphrasing here): ‘Nigeria has done so much for doctors. Abroad, they have to pay for residency,’’ and on….

You know, some of these people think that somehow, these types of things will not be historically relevant or consequential. They are wrong, as you cannot airbrush this sort of foolishness from history. History is not going to be kind towards them.

These days, I am much less prone to verbose prose, so here is the summary of this article: A country that trains doctors and allows them to leave to serve other countries is a doomed country. That country is NOT a country that is going to make it. The reason for despair, however, is more related to our attitude as citizens. The quote ‘A people deserve the leadership they get’ becomes more profound to me as the years roll by.

I am utterly discouraged not because our leaders are haplessly driving us aground, but because there seems to be so many people (including my contemporaries) who mirror the views of the people dispossessing us as a country!

In a nutshell, if you are one of those people who do not appreciate the need to agitate for improved welfare for doctors, I want you to (1) realise that there is something very wrong with your reasoning. Please believe it, because it is the unbiased truth. (2) You are a big part of the problem we have as a country. (3) If you have the means, please work on changing your perspective. Thank you.

Collectively, we must force the government to invest more (and when I say more, I mean substantively so) in healthcare. We don’t have much choice here: we must agitate for consistent and equitable government spending on health.

Can we retain doctors? I think we can at least try? But I honestly intend to find out. In the next few weeks, I will conduct a poll assessing doctors’ opinions and preferences. What is most important to Nigerian-trained doctors? Financial renumeration? Career progression? Quality of postgraduate training? Better working conditions? If one or more of these are significantly improved, let’s try to find out what percentage of doctors will readily stay back and work in Nigeria! Based on our findings, we officially begin to task the government to do more, but with better focus.

It is important to clarify that not everyone who discredits doctors’ strike action(s) or other forms of agitation is disingenuous.  Deep mistrust of elites and experts is rife, and some people are truly ignorant.

I think Journalists (a group of Nigerians that I do not readily criticise), need to act accordingly. One of the most critical roles of journalism is to place these sorts of issues on the public agenda, facilitate healthy debates and educate those that are sceptical.

Please understand something: this isnt merely about doctors’ welfare, this is about developing healthcare/medical care capacity in Nigeria. Doctors and other healthcare workers are better suited to ensure that our health instituitons are run by bright, forward thinking individuals, not sloppy people who are fanatical about hegemonic methods and policies. In any case, you cannot seperate quality healthcare delivery from doctors’ welfare, really. All Nigerians must stand together to insist on improved healthcare. The fight will be more effective, if we unite and give this issue the priority it truly deserves. Our house is on fire. Literarily so and we are not doing anything to curb the fire.

My fellow compatriots, the thing that is coming is holding a stick and wearing a hat. There is still some sun up, to dry our clothes, but we must act now, before the sun totally sets. Our attitude must be that of a group of people intent on averting disaster.

Send me one word that best describes what that attitude should be- seunalegbeleye@gmail.com

Thanks for spending part of your time with me, I’ll see you next time!