Bauchi state governor, Bala Mohammed, has announced that students pursuing medical and health courses in the State will be automatically hired upon graduation.
“As a measure to maintain the major optimum requirements to the healthcare profession in the state, this administration has reintroduced the pre-service scheme where students offering medical and health courses are given automatic employment,” he stated.
“That is our health students, the midwives and the nurses in our tertiary institutions,” he added.
The governor made the scheme public recently while inaugurating two newly built primary healthcare centres in the Bauchi metropolis’ Gidan Dubu and Fadamamada communities.
He stated that the two health centres were built in collaboration with development partners such as UNICEF, the European Union, and USAID.
The government, he claimed, places a high value on healthcare delivery because “health is wealth, and a healthy society is a productive society.”
According to him, his administration attempted to address the challenges facing the health sector, particularly in service delivery, infrastructure, and human resource development.
Governor Bala said; “Consequently, since the inception of this administration, we have been able to construct four general hospitals where there were none as well as 15 primary healthcare centres.
“We have also renovated and equipped 10 secondary and 10 primary health facilities across the state.”
“These are in addition to the 107 and 204 primary and secondary health facilities, renovated and upgraded through the support of EU, UNICEF and NSHIP projects, respectively,” he added.
Mr Mohammed, however, guaranteed the people of the state that all developmental projects initiated by this administration would be completed within the remaining tenure of his administration.
The state’s health commissioner, Sabiu Gwalabe, also commended the governor for prioritising the health sector.
Further, he urged the benefiting communities to express gratitude to the current administration for making their decade-long dreams a reality.
UNICEF’s health specialist, Oluseyi Olusehinde, also revealed that the organisation had a partnership with the Bauchi government.
He stated; “In addition to the contribution you are making yearly to this PHC MoU, we are glad to say that every year, you are adding new structures, new primary healthcare centres to the number of primary healthcare centres in Bauchi state.
“We are also grateful to say that by the beginning of your administration, there were some wards in Bauchi without PHC centres, but as of now, we are glad to say that you have covered all those wards.”
Recall that on November 17th, 2022, the Bauchi State Government allocated N30.5 billion to the health ministry from the N202 billion 2023 budget presented by the governor to the House of Assembly for approval.
