Stakeholders in Ibadan, including traditional leaders, the Ibadan Compound Peace Initiative (ICPI), and prominent sons and daughters of the city, have expressed deep concern over the persistent power outages at the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan.
They lamented that the recurring electricity issues at critical units of the hospital continue to affect many underprivileged patients, causing distress among residents of Ibadan and Oyo State.
It will be recalled that a few months ago, patients at UCH protested inadequate healthcare services due to power shortages, and more recently, University of Ibadan (UI) students staged a protest to voice their concerns over the worsening situation.
In a statement issued by ICPI’s Coordinator on behalf of stakeholders, they called on the government and relevant authorities to take immediate action to rescue the hospital.
They described UCH as a heritage not only for Ibadan but for the entire Southwest and Nigeria, warning that the institution is on the verge of collapse.
The stakeholders emphasized that Ibadan and Oyo State residents account for 90% of UCH’s patients, questioning how many more lives must be lost before decisive action is taken.
The statement reads, “We are inaundated with the ongoing power outage at UCH, our investigation revealed that UCH are helpless because IBEDC took them from Band B to Band A, how will an hospital that was not able to meet it’s financial requireme being in B and will be to pay now that it has been upgraded to band A? where will they get money to pay?
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“Their bill monthly was increased from N20m to N40m, and its now N99m per month, where would they see such money? Was the same bill giving to other teaching hospitals across the country, shouldn’t be a concession IBEDC should be doing for teaching hospitals like UCH considering it’s service delivery in health sector?
“All effort of UCH management on the issue has been frustrated by IBEDC, for now, UCH didn’t have enough fund to go into alternative power supply like solar and others.
“Can we say President Tinubu is not kind enough to Ibadan by giving us Ibadan son as Minister for Power? Adelabu said he is making plan to savage this issues, how many people will have to die as a result of power outage at critical section of UCH?
“Where is our political office holders in this matter, UCH has written several letters to the Governor of the state, to federal government and management of IBEDC on the issue to no avail . The management has contacted the Indigenous Group like Central Council of Ibadan Indigenes (CCII) and other Pressure groups, yet no result.
“When will the Independent Power Project (IPP) by the state government take effect? How many people will have to die before the magic from the federal ministry of power begin.
“Let’s IBEDC restore the light immediately, they shouldn’t allow poor people to die, our leaders and politicians know how to run abroad to seek for medical care whenever the need arises
“Ibadan people are not happy, Mogajis are not happy, poor people are dying on daily basis, power must be restore to UCH now unconditionally.”
