Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Gida Mustapha has described himself as a village boy without sliver spoon in his mouth.
The SGF, who is a lawyer by profession , said he was not born as ‘Ajebota’ (privileged child), saying: “I was born a rural Nigerian. I grew up in rural Nigeria, I went to school in rural Nigeria and I still live in rural Nigeria.
“Yola is my home, I’m just on a journey here in Abuja. At the end of my work or whatever I am doing here, I will return home which is rural Nigeria and I am going to live with the facilities in rural Nigeria.”
Boss Mustapha, who was today, April 10, reacting to news attributed to him saying he never knew that Nigeria’s medical sector was this bad, said that he he didn’t say such a thing because he really knew it better those in big cities.
“My statement was totally taken out of context because that was not the reflection of what I said. But having to serve in this committee gave me a further insight into what is happening.
”Most of the things you see around as specialists, hospitals or clinics, you just see the buildings, you don’t know what is inside.
“But being in this committee has given me opportunity of walking into these facilities, looking at what they have in relation to what they ought to have, my conclusion on that is that they don’t have what they ought to have.”
Boss Mustapha, who is the chairman of the Presidential Task Force on the control of the COVID -19 pandemic, said: “I must clarify that I am aware and has indeed been a champion for the reform and transformation of the health care system.
“However, this PTF assignment has afforded me the opportunity to dig deeper, interrogate and x-ray the system better. …So for anyone to think that I didn’t know the level of deplorable state of our healthcare systems, is a complete misrepresentation.
“For the benefit of those who do not know me well, I come from rural Nigeria. I was born in a college almost 64 years ago that didn’t even have a hospital, it had small missionary dispensary probably with one midwife, no birth certificate was offered.
” So I don’t even have birth certificate, I have declaration of age.
“A lot of you sitting here are privileged to have been born in a better and more equipped medical facilities. So from birth I know the state of our medical, healthcare, I am not a foreigner.
“The truth of the matter is that this is not the time to be distracted with unnecessary controversies.”
