By Agbereowei Arumoh
Former Vice President of Nigeria, Yemi Osinbajo, has advocated rapid development for Southern Ijaw Local Government Area of Bayelsa State, noting that the people have been denied basic infrastructure and amenities for a long time.
Professor Osinbajo made the call at a reception organized by the Bayelsa State Government in his honor after inaugurating the newly completed 6.75-kilometre Agbura-Ox-bow Lake Road in Yenagoa, the state capital, and the one hundred-bed Oporoma Referral Hospital at Osokama in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area.
Professor Osinbajo expressed satisfaction over the completion of the 630-metre Oporoma Bridge crossing the River Nun, which had been in the pipeline for over sixty years before Governor Diri constructed it.
Before arriving in Oporoma, the Former Vice President passed through the 630 meter Angiama Bridge inauguared by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on April 10 this year, a facility which Professor Osinbajo performed the groundbreaking in 2022.
At the Oporoma Referral Hospital the former Vice President was told the project was initiated in 1973, about 53 years ago, and was not completed by successive administrations until Governor Diri remodeled it and put it to use.
The facility has accommodation for twenty-two health personnel and provides accident and emergency services, comprehensive maternal and child health services, diagnostic and imaging services, pharmacy services, public health and preventive services, as well as surgical services.
The hospital also has an 85 KVA power panel donated by the Niger Delta Development Commission to provide electricity for the facility.
As part of activities for the inauguration of the hospital, over five hundred medical cases were registered for free treatment, ranging from surgical operations to other forms of treatment.
Professor Osinbajo decried the long period both the Oporoma Bridge and the referral hospital had remained on the drawing board before Governor Diri’s intervention, despite the area’s huge contribution of oil revenue to the federation account.
Governor Diri, who said politics is meant to bring development to the people, pledged to connect Oporoma and the hospital to the state-owned gas turbine, construct the road leading from Oporoma main town to Osokama, where the hospital is situated, and also provide perimeter fencing for the hospital.
Commissioner for Health, Professor Seiyefa Brisibe, explained that the present administration had provided two hundred functional primary health facilities and thirty functional hospitals across Bayelsa State.
Two beneficiaries of the free medical treatment, Mr. Gbuduwei Upright and Mr. Abel Akila, who were operated on for hernia, stated that they could not afford payment for their treatment, which was why they had endured the excruciating pain until the free treatment.
The inauguration also featured blood sugar testing, cervical cancer screening, and other services.
