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General Lagbaja: Rise, Deities Of Vengeance [OPINION]

Published

11 months ago

November 19, 2024

Editor

By Suyi Ayodele

“Generally, any of my children or wives can have access to my grave site to pray and or seek spiritual assistance.” This is the last paragraph of the Will of the late grandfather of human rights activism in Nigeria, Chief Gani Fawehinmi. The Will was dated December 19, 2008.

The late lawyer, a devout Muslim in his lifetime, believed that the dead can commune with the living. Hence, in his Will, he granted permission for his children and wives to seek spiritual assistance at his grave side. Modern-day religionists would call him names. But the man called Gani would not bulge. The paragraph preceding the quoted one has a curse embedded in it. Hear Fawehinmi again:

“I plead with all my children and wives not to resort to any form of court litigation over my Will. They should resolve amicably any dispute or controversy with themselves…. I have had enough of painful struggles and controversies in my lifetime, I should be allowed to rest in peace. If any child or wife breaches this passionate plea, he or she will reap my displeasure and wrath.”

Fawehinmi died on September 5, 2009, barely a year after he deposed to the Will. It has been over 15 years since the great man passed on. Nobody has heard about any rumble in his family over the Will. The people he left behind are aware of the efficacy of the curse the man imposed on any would-be ‘troubler of Israel’ in his family. They knew how fiery the man was when alive. They can then understand how terrible his “wrath” would be should anyone go against his last wish. That is a good example of a man who never forgot his tradition!

We are heavily metaphysical as Africans, and more importantly, as Yoruba. We have however, lost our sense of originality to Western culture. I am an advocate for cultural renaissance, any day. And my calling as a Christian remains unimpaired.

A senior pastor in my church once accused me of “venerating Ifa above Jesus.” He made the comment after reading one of my pieces on this page where I volunteered to be a diviner for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. I responded by asking him to allow Jesus, the ‘Author and Finisher of our faith’, to be the ultimate judge. No man holds the keys to the City of David in his hands. A lot of intimidation takes place in the name of the Gospel. Yet, the ones who brought the new religion to us hold on to their culture, undiluted!

We have abandoned what our forebears handed over to us. If all we do as Africans in terms of worship is all for the Devil, what is the fate of those who left this planet before Christianity and Islam were introduced to us? My family progenitor, the famous Baba Alaajole, the inimitable Òbomolè Bo Ogun (The one who worships deities, worships amulets, and venerates charms), was an acclaimed traditional paediatrician (Aremo). Many children were saved by what he had in his medicine pots! Is he in heaven or hell now because he did not know anything about Jesus? Or would he be covered by the “period of Grace”? Phew!

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I watched the funeral rites for the late Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt. General Taoreed Abiodun Lagbaja, on the television last Friday. It was a colourful ceremony. The military razzmatazz was heavy. General Lagbaja deserved all the encomiums and military rites of passage accorded him. He died on November 5, 2024, at a very tender aga of 56. But he was buried like a nonagenarian. He should be happy where he is now. General Lagbaja’s funeral was a good one except that he was denied what would have made the event better, or the best for him. That is pitiful and sad!

A man is a product of his people, or his family. The late General Lagbaja was not an exception. He came from somewhere. He was a member of a family, a community and a society. His people in Ilobu town, Osun State, never believed and will never believe that the late military officer died a natural death. I don’t blame them. That is how we are wired as a people.

Age 56 is nothing among our people. A 56-year-old man is still a child. My older sister, Anti mi Idowu, called me her “kid brother” the other time. I smiled. I am closer to 60 than 50 but I am still a “kid brother” to her! Yes. It is true; a child is never old in the eyes of the parents. Anti mi Idowu, I was told, broke the rules in her Modern School to rush home to carry me hours after I arrived on this side of the planet. So, I remain her “kid brother” till Thy Kingdom come!

I also recall here that my father, Baba Daniel Falade, passed on at age 87 in January 1987. The news was broken to one of his great cousins, Yeye Ifábonmí Ipindogan, popularly known as Yeye Alaro (she was into tie and dye), was told, she reported: “this . The old woman, on hearing the news, said: “This child” eventually died of this emere (ogbanje) spirit that had afflicted him from birth! Yeye Alaro was right. Baba Falade was a child at 87 because the old woman’s first child, Baba Akinwumi, was almost the same age as Baba Falade! This is why Yeye Alaro believed that it was the Ogbanje spirit that ‘killed’ her cousin at 87!

If Ilobu people believe that General Lagbaja died too young at 56, they are right. If they hold the belief that Lagbaja’s death was not natural, nobody can fault them. That is why I believe that the Federal Government should have yielded to their demand to have the late General buried in Ilobu with all the traditional rites for a man suspected to have been cut short in life, performed!

It doesn’t matter anyone’s view, particularly, the ‘saint’ Christians and Muslims, who hold the belief that such practice is ‘fetish’. We must first get this right; every funeral ceremony is a rite, a ritual, if we all get the definitions of rite and ritual right. And, if the question is if I believe in traditional rites for a departed soul under the circumstances of the late General Lagbaja, my answer is an emphatic YES!

I was a freelance reporter with the defunct Sunday Diet Newspaper in 1997, when the late General Oladipo Diya and other top Yoruba Military officers were arrested by the expired Head of State, General Sani Abacha, for coup plotting. At our editorial meeting of December 22, 1997, conveyed by our Editor, Sheddy Ozoene, his deputy and head of our features desk, Ikechukwu Amaechi, was assigned to coordinate the magazine report of the arrests. I was assigned to cover General Diya while Yinka Oyebode, the current spokesman to Ekiti State governor, was assigned to cover General Tajudeen Olanrewaju.

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I arrived at Odogbolu very late in the night. I was fortunate to find a small drinking party at a joint. I joined the party despite their suspicion of me as a security agent. My head could manage a bottle or two then. I ordered a beer and sent three bottles of the brand they were managing to the table of a three ‘friendly’-looking party across. They looked at me and gestured thank you.

After a while, I moved to their table and explained my mission. I showed them.my identity card, a note on the letterhead of Diet Newspaper and my passport photograph. The life of a freelance journalist! Not enviable in any way! They believed me and helped me to secure accommodation in one dingy hotel, with a promise that one of them would come to take me round the town the following day.

The day broke and my friend showed up. We walked around the town. The first things I noticed were various pots of ritual items and palm fronds. I asked what happened just to be sure. My contact said they were rituals for the release of General Diya. Then I noticed four bigger ritual spots. What distinguished them was the presence of pèrègún shrubs. That must have been a big ritual based on my little knowledge of pèrègun and its uses. It is not a common element of your daily rituals!

My contact took me to the Alaye of Odogbolu. Kabiyesi was not willing to talk. But he, nevertheless, mentioned that Diya would come out alive. I was taken to the Anglican priest in town, then to one of the General’s classmates. We visited the General’s uncle, a blacksmith. He wore a melancholic posture. He told me nothing would happen to his nephew. He exuded confidence as he intoned that the kolanut will always be buried by the leaves (ewé ni ó ma si obì) and added that the gourd will break first before the water inside will spill (kèrègbè má fó kí omi iní è tó dànù). I understood him.

My contact finally took me to an old Baba’s house, where I saw what my people called èrù (fear). My contact told me in the English Language that the old man was behind all the rituals I saw earlier. I asked the old man if he believed in the efficacy of the rituals. He affirmed that. Then curiosity took over me. I pointed out that I saw pèrègún shrubs in town. The old man kept a straight face. I prodded further. Why pèrègún? The old man looked at me and asked if I knew what people used pèrègún for. I explained to him the little knowledge I had.

The old man said that the little I knew should guide me. Then he uttered the familiar words peculiar to pèrègún. He said: pèrègún will always outlive the deity (Pèrègún ló ma réhìn imalè)). He emphasised that General Diya would outlive all his traducers in the matter. The session closed. I thanked my contact and headed back to Lagos.

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Less than six months later, General Abacha expired on June 8, 1998. He was said to be doing the thing after eating an Adamic apple, when he answered ‘present sir’ before his maker! General Diya and others were released. The Odogbolu-born General passed on on March 26, 2023, in a way my people described as peaceful death (Ó fowó rorí kú). His people believed in the power of rituals. They performed rites before the various gods of the town. All the deities were given what they relish best. And General Diya survived the executioners’ bullets. How I wished they had allowed Ilobu to do the same for Lagbaja.

This is why the funeral of General Lagbaja without the input of his townsmen remains painful. God owns life. He alone determines when to take it. Nobody is contesting that. However, the Scripture also tells us that we should not be unmindful of the wiles of the devil because we wrestle against power and principalities, rulers of the darkness of this age and spiritual wickedness in high places. (Ephesians 6:11-12),

This is the belief Ilobu people have. That is why they requested that the late General Lagbaja be given to them to bury their own way. I don’t think that was too much of a request. The Federal Government and the Nigerian Army could still have had their colourful ceremony for the departed General in Ilobu as they did in Abuja.

A man belongs to his community. Lagbaja belonged to the Ilobu town. His placenta was buried in the town. They are his source; they know his origin. This is a case of the ancient divination, Ogbè Móhunfólóhun (Give unto a man what belongs to him). If indeed Lagbaja’s life was cut short by the wicked, his people had been denied the opportunity to call on the owners of the land to rise and avenge them. The sermon of ‘from-sand-we-come-and-unto-sand-we -return’ would not suffice here.

We need to have a reorientation about our culture, norms and world outlook. It is unfortunate that while those who brought Christianity to us never abandoned their own culture, we the converts threw away everything that is our heritage. The British brought the ancient throne from Edinburgh for the coronation of King Charles III. But in Ogbomosho of all ancient towns, we made the traditional ruler kneel before a pastor who placed his hand on the Oba’s head. Ogbomosho has in the last one year been moving from one needless crisis to the over the Imam of the town; a matter that should not concern the Oba! Unfortunately, nobody is asking what went wrong.

Take the case of Ikú Bàbá Yèyé, the late Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi III, for instance. Over two years after the passing of the foremost Yoruba traditional ruler, the throne has been empty! That is not just an embarrassment to the Oyo Alaafin people but the entire Yoruba Race and Black Africa. Why is the throne of Oranmiyan vacant? Why are the Oyo princes at one another’s throats? Why are we finding it difficult to do it the way it ought to be done so that it can be the way it should be?

Daily, we lose the last vestiges of the things our forebears left for us. Our women kneel completely to venerate their ‘daddies-in-the Lord but can hardly genuflect to greet their husbands. Pastors, Imams and other ‘spiritual godfathers’ keep brainwashing us and nobody is paying attention.

When I told some people that there are some altar calls, I would not respond to, they said I was not ‘broken’. How on earth would I allow any pastor to tell me to “use your two hands to hold your head and say, ‘my head, reject evil’”, and I would do so when I had witnessed that countless times at Baba Falade’s divination sessions?

What is the difference between a pastor asking me to touch the ground and touch my head and my late father asking his divination clients to touch the ground and touch their head and thank their destiny (Orí)?

Going by the tributes at General Lagbaja’s funeral, one can easily conclude that he was a great soldier, and a nice guy. I join my voice to thousands of others in wishing his family the fortitude to bear the loss.

But, more importantly to me, I wish Ilobu people home and in the Diaspora, divine vengeance on those they suspected were responsible for the demise of their kinsman. Even if cancer was the harbinger of that death, it must die. This should be its last act of heartlessness.

And for the departed soul, General Lagbaja, before you rest in peace, if indeed someone or a group of people were responsible for your ‘untimely’ departure, visit them in anger. When they walk in the day, let them be afraid. At night, let them hear footsteps. When they eat, may they not be satisfied and when they drink water, let their thirst not be assuaged. After that, Rest in Peace, Soldier Man!

News

OPINION: ‘Federal Highways of Horror’

Published

54 minutes ago

October 13, 2025

Editor

By Lasisi Olagunju

You know where the latest anti-government journalists are in Lagos? Kirikiri. On a day that Nigerians were celebrating an additional spur of 100 kilometres to the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Road, the killjoys of Kirikiri struck. They took a happy, joyous people of 200 million on a gruelling, bumpy ride across the country. They ran painful stories of craters and potholes and headlined them: ‘Federal Highways of Horror.’

It is a miracle that our Minister of Works, Dave Umahi, has not pummeled the Lagos newspaper called Vanguard. It ran the bad stories. It is still unclear why the minister has not rebuked its owner and spanked its journalists for publishing what they were not supposed to publish. Not once, but twice, last week they allowed the devil to use them to tell stories of collapsed federal roads from the north to the south. Their stories portrayed hardworking Umahi as a failure in monumental proportions.

Those journalists, injected with an overdose of impudence, said they did an investigation. They painted a grim picture of federal highways across multiple Nigerian states suffering severe neglect. They said the neglect has made travel dangerous, expensive, and time-consuming. They wrote as if they were sent to pull down a house built by God.

In the South, they came up with a long list of bad roads. They said northern states shared the same story of pain. They described some roads as crater-filled horror scenes; some as barely passable, others as sites long abandoned by contractors. On the few ones harbouring contractors, the signs they displayed showed slow men at work.

It does not rain; it pours. Amid narratives of millions of bad federal roads, Umahi made himself professor last week. “I am a professor of Engineering,” he announced on national television. Professor Umahi? I pray he is not asked to name the king who blessed him with that chieftaincy title. Some Arise News television journalists, whose eyes lack lashes, forced him to make himself professor. They habitually tug at the hem of Umahi’s professorial gown. They pelt him with questions that should never be asked. They remind our working Minister of Works that a river that is not dirty does not hide its depth. Last week, they demanded the cost of federal roads per kilometre. Who does that? And, I am happy, Minister Umahi gave it back to them. He said they are illiterates. Yeah. Don’t they know that for our federal government, spirits decide the total costs of projects? If they were truly not illiterates, they would know that this government is a wholesale seller and buyer; it is too rich to do retail business measured with short tape rules and elementary school rulers.

Oyo State governor, Seyi Makinde, thought because he was governor and engineer he could join the talk and say that calculating the average cost per kilometre was possible in road construction. He was similarly told by our minister to shut up or he would be summoned to a debate on the very difficult mathematics of road construction. Umahi said he is Makinde’s senior in engineering. Senior Prefect Umahi described electrical electronics engineers as ‘technicians’ who must not speak on project costs.

Now, what we are told to hold as knowledge from Professor Umahi is that it is impossible to know how much a kilometre of road costs in Nigeria until such projects are completed. God is great. The World Bank must have missed that wisdom back in 1999 when it created the Road Costs Knowledge System (ROCKS), a database that calmly lists what it costs to build or fix a kilometre of road from Umahi’s village in Ebonyi to Makinde’s Ajia in Ibadan. A key feature of the World Bank’s ROCKS is its record of actual and estimated road work costs, clearly defined per kilometre and per square metre. Apparently, only in Nigeria do roads and their costs defy mathematics and logic.

In utter helplessness, we watch the roads and their costs stretch and shrink like chewing gum depending on whose fingers are working the calculator. While other countries classify their roads by type and cost per kilometre, we prefer a more spiritual approach – if you are an enemy, call it faith-based budgeting.

Clarity is the father of all openness. Why is it missing here? Again, that is not a question or a proverb that we must hear again from anyone, especially professional troublemakers called journalists. What is the problem of Nigerian journalists? Because their eyes have no skin, they query power. Where a cup is half-full, what our journalists see all their lives is a half-empty cup. They didn’t start today. They are historically insolent. What they do to this government, they did to even our ancestor, Lord Lugard, in 1913, one full year before Amalgamation. On 8 March, 1913, one rude journalist working with a newspaper called Lagos Weekly Record wrote that Lugard was a wicked, ruthless character, “a man whose walking stick is a pistol and whose thoughts by day and dreams at night are punitive expeditions and military patrols.”

And what was Lugard’s reaction to such attacks? He fought them with laws and knocks. At a point, he documented their impudence with a letter to his wife, Flora. In the letter, he bunched the journalist with all the other “educated native” who deserved no sympathy. He wrote about the native enemy of the state: “His loud and arrogant conceit are distasteful to me, his lack of natural dignity and of courtesy antagonise me.” Lugard’s biographer, Margery Perham, graciously remembered to put this in the book: ‘Lugard: The Years of Authority’ on page 585. If you can’t get Perham but are fortunate to get Jonathan Derrick’s ‘Africa, Empire and Fleet Street’, check the details there. They are on page 115.

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So, as Lugard, the creator of Nigeria rightly wrote, the Nigerian journalist is arrogant and lacks courtesy. Such are called alárífín in Yoruba. In the days of old, the crime of àrífín carried capital punishment. Aróbafín l’oba npa. But today’s journalists are lucky that they are in a republican democracy. Even then, someone should pay for their bad behaviour. The slap they get from ministers like Umahi is the first tranche of the cost of their bad manners.

What should the state do to the conceited who won’t let expressway contracts be awarded expressly in peace? I have a solution to their problem: Like the Vanguard, they should all be relocated to Kirikiri; all of them, from Lagos to Ibadan; from Ibadan to Lagos. And, if I had my way, I would tip off Umahi and all his harangued hardworking colleagues to award contracts this week for more cells for enemies of the president’s coastal elephant and other projects of renewal. Their new accommodation should enjoy maximum security. They deserve Kirikiri, Kirikiri deserves them.

What comes fast cannot be delayed again. It happened to cricket. Cricket set his wedding day and simultaneously asked his doctor to start preparing for child delivery. The contracts for a safe house for Nigerian journalists can be awarded today, or, latest tomorrow. There is no need for formalities. Exactly like the Coastal Road contract, this is another no for competitive bidding. We already know contractors with proven track records of expertise in casting beams and building cells. We select and hit the site digging. We can fix the contract cost after the job is done.

From this point, we see long shadows over the country; there is no clarity about important things government do. But, one day soon, like sun rays, clarity will force its way in; it is the father of openness.

Now, beyond the scaffold of satire, I wish I could just tear the mask and tell Minister Umahi that what we have today under his watch is road transportation without roads. And he is Minister of Works in charge of roads. It is a shame.

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In May this year (2025), I wrote ‘The shame of Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road.’ The first two paragraphs of the piece read:

“Mr Dele Alake represents Ekiti State in the Federal Executive Council. Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola represents Osun State in the Federal Executive Council. Mr Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo represents Ondo State in the Federal Executive Council. All three of them are the president’s core men. Each time the council sits and approves federal roads for reconstruction in states other than theirs, what goes on in their minds? They are very powerful ministers but all federal roads that lead to their states are decrepit and abandoned. And they know. So, what is the problem?

“The Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road that links these ministers’ states to Lagos and to the North is the worst in Nigeria. Senate leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, is from Ekiti State. He belongs to the president’s inner caucus. Tough-talking PDP Senator Francis Fadahunsi represents Ife-Ijesa senatorial district. There are seven other senators and several Reps of APC and PDP from those three states. Has anyone heard them say or do anything to make that road well again? Do these people go home and how do they get home whenever they go home? Nigerians of all states lose lives and limbs on that road daily. Death by installments on the road is harrowing and it is a daily experience. It is a fitting tribute to the attention we pay to our people’s welfare.”

That was on May 12, 2025 (five months ago). If the road was “going, going” when I wrote that piece, it is gone now. Gone. An ex-senator told a columnist in May this year that N20 billion had been “released for repairs” of that road. In August 2025, Umahi announced the release of 30 percent of the contract sum. How much is the contract sum? Don’t even go there. If you go there, the minister will be angry. He will remind you that you are not a road professor. If you must ask any question at all, ask what has happened to what Umahi said was released, his 30 percent. Ask, because, nothing that is worth one kobo has happened on that road this year.

But the total collapse of the road did not come to me as a surprise. By the noon of May 12, 2025 when I published the article, one of the senators I called out in the piece called me.

“They have just read to me what you wrote.” He told me. Big men don’t read newspapers; newspapers are read to big men. Senator said he laughed at my naivety. He wondered why I was disturbing myself writing rubbish about a contract that may never be executed.

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“Do you think Nigeria can ever be better than it is? (Sé ìwo rò wípé Nigeria lè dára jù báyìí lo ni?)” He asked and proceeded to shame me with names, facts and figures all of which answered his question with a no. He said I should record and publish all he said. I laughed at the audacity of his directive. An orphan like me will never dare court a wound on the back.

Besides, I was taught early in life to make my eyes flexible enough for them to see the nose. That was the wisdom that eluded Partridge who claimed to know it all, and because he made that claim, he blocked his own opportunity to learn Ifá from the pigeon. ‘Mo m’Obàrà, mo m’Ofún,’ tí kò j e kí ẹyẹlé k’ àparò n’Ífá (I know Obàrà, I know Ofún’ made the pigeon not to teach Ifá to the partridge).

So, my pigeon listened attentively to the incantation from the hawk. This senator ended his long, windy speech with a submission that the Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road, and other federal roads in the South-West were decrepit and abandoned because the Works Minister “does not like hearing South-West at all.” I heard him and sighed.

When the outspoken gentleman spoke with me five months ago, he was a PDP senator. He has since moved to Dave Umahi’s party. Now, I wonder if he will still say what he said now that he is in APC.

Author and literary critic, Robert M. Wren (1928-1989), in 1982 wrote “The Last Bridge on ‘The Road’: Soyinka’s Rage and Compassion.” He tells us that in 1962, Wole Soyinka, in a Lagos Daily Express essay entitled ‘Bad Roads, Bad Users, Bad Deaths’ captured Nigeria’s enduring road crisis. Writing with outrage and in satire, Soyinka lamented the deadly state of the highways. He agonised over the state of the Lagos–Ibadan road (Mile 34); there was what he called “the death-trap at Ife”, and “the last bridge on Ikorodu Road.” Soyinka recalled and deplored a senator’s refusal to carry a crash victim with a spinal cord injury to Ibadan. More than six decades later, the roads are still bad, very bad; they still kill; senators are still cold-blooded; they still wonder why anyone bothers to care that the roads are bad.

News

Edo GIS Denies Report Of 17-year-old Purchasing 14 Hectares Of Land

Published

2 hours ago

October 13, 2025

Editor

The Edo Geographic Information Systems (Edo GIS) has debunked reports circulating on social media that a 17-year-old boy purchased 14 hectares of land in Edo State and was subsequently denied a Certificate of Occupancy (C of O) by Governor Monday Okpebholo.

In a statement released by the Director of Press, Tunde Egbiremonlen, the agency clarified that no such transaction exists in its records.

According to the statement, a 17-year-old is legally considered a minor and, as such, is not eligible to register land ownership under Edo State law.

“The Edo GIS system will automatically reject such applications due to age restrictions,” the statement read

“In the first place, a 17-year-old cannot apply for registration of land in Edo state because that age bracket is assumed to be a minor; the Edo GIS system will automatically reject the application.

“To compound the objective of the rumour-mongers, the peddlers of the story did not explain where in Edo state, such 14,000 hectares were purchased by the minor.

Egbiremonlen also pointed out inconsistencies in the viral report, noting that it failed to mention the specific location of the alleged 14 hectares and described the story as “deliberately mischievous and fabricated.”

He accused the originators of the false information of attempting to cause disaffection and blackmail the government, saying significant funds were spent to circulate the fake news.

Edo GIS urged the public to disregard the claims and remain vigilant against disinformation aimed at undermining the government’s credibility.

News

Edo Promises Effective PHCs In 192 Wards

Published

2 hours ago

October 13, 2025

Editor

The Edo state government said it is committed to ensuring effective Primary Healthcare Centres across all the 192 wards of the state.

The state deputy governor, Hon. Dennis Idahosa, said this during a federal government-backed supervision and inspection of the Oghede PHC in Ovia North-East Local Government Area.

The visit was part of an oversight function by Members of the House of Representatives Committee on Healthcare to assess the progress of the World Bank and Edo State Government-supported “IMPACT” Project — Immunization Plus and Malaria Progress by Accelerating Coverage and Transforming Services.

According to a release by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr Friday Aghedo, the deputy governor, said that the aim was to improve access to quality healthcare services, especially in rural areas

He added that it would also improve maternal and child healthcare services

Idahosa declared that governor Monday Okpebholo is committed to fulfilling this promise.

Speaking to his former colleagues in the Green chamber, Idahosa highlighted the administration’s focus on health reforms.

“The Monday Okpebholo led government is determined to deliver on its campaign promises, particularly in healthcare sector.

“The Commissioner for Health, Dr. Cyril Oshiomhole and other agency heads are working together for the good of Edo people,” he said.

Idahosa expressed satisfaction with the quality of work at the Oghede PHC, describing the facility as a model for other centres.

“I am very impressed with what I have seen here today. The prototype is good, the health workers are dedicated, and with the team we have in place, Edo people will be happy,” he noted.

He said that the state’s ongoing efforts at upgrading PHCs have significantly strengthened primary healthcare services across Edo.

He commended the Chairman of the House Committee on Healthcare, Hon. Amos Gwamna Magaji, for his support, saying, “From what we are seeing here today, we are not just meeting expectations, we are ahead of the curve nationally.”

Magaji, who once chaired the committee before Idahosa’s transition to state politics, described the visit as “a meeting of fate.”

He said the committee’s oversight focused on evaluating the use of federal government and World Bank funds to improve health infrastructure across states.

“Our mandate is to oversee the basic healthcare provision fund and ensure states like Edo are well positioned to achieve universal health coverage by 2030.

“Universal primary healthcare is the foundation of every nation’s health system, and we can not succeed without it,” he stated.

He expressed satisfaction with the level of government participation and the quality of the Oghede facility, noting that it effectively serves vulnerable groups.

“Nigeria currently faces one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. To reverse this, PHCs must be well-equipped and staffed,” he stated.

He also called on residents to take advantage of health facilities within their communities, noting that the human resources are in place to serve them.

Providing further insight, Edo State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Cyril Oshiomhole explained the classification of the “Level 2 PHC.”

According to him, “A Level 2 PHC is one that has two consulting rooms, a labour ward, an operating theatre, male and female wards, immunization areas, and staff quarters — all with access to electricity and water.”

He revealed that 61 such PHCs are being developed across the state; 21 in Edo South, 20 in Edo Central, and 20 in Edo North, and assured that construction would be completed within the next two weeks.

Project Manager of the IMPACT initiative, Dr. Idemudia Osayomore, added that the upgraded facilities would offer key services at no cost.

“Services are free for pregnant women, children under five, and the elderly above 65 years, in order to reduce maternal and child mortality,” he said.

The IMPACT Project, jointly funded by the Federal and Edo State Governments with support from the World Bank and the Edo Health Insurance Scheme (EDOHIS), aims to expand access to subsidized healthcare services and accelerate progress toward universal health coverage.