“It could be said that Abia State is terribly sick in every sense of the word. Under the present dispensation, the state is lying prostrate. In fact, Abia has never had it so bad. There is no sector of the state that one could point at and say that the out-going government got a pass mark. Someone once said that the state was worse than Ebola and I agree with him. In terms of infrastructural, economic, and socio-cultural development, the state has performed woefully in the last eight years or so. To put it in capsule form, Abia, which prides itself as God’s own state, needs redemption.”
This was how Mr Ignatius Agbanyim, an Umuahia-based businessman, aptly captured the state of affairs in Abia. Like many Abians and residents, he is appalled by the dismal performance of the out-going administration, which glorifies itself in “manufactured realities,” as Ben Okri would say.
Consider Uche Igwe’s take: “It is generally believed that T.A.Orji’s leadership is the worst the state has ever experienced since its creation. However, his media aides disagree vehemently. But, whatever anyone can say, the state government has invested heavily in propaganda and billboards all over the state praising the governor, ostensibly for presiding over the impoverishment of Abians.”
The state’s School of Nursing, Aba is a classic example of how bad things have gone in Abia in the last couple of years. Like any other public institutions in Abia State, the school is simply in a highly deplorable condition. Indeed, to put it mildly, the school which was built in 1954 by the colonial masters is in a mess and total collapse.
The school, which serves as the incubator, a pioneer training apparatus of nurses in the South East, is today a mere shadow of its glorious past. Things have gone so bad in the school that the Nursing Council of Nigeria (NCN), the regulatory body of Nursing Schools in Nigeria, has de-accredited and asked the management to train out the students. What this means is that the existence of the school now hangs in the balance as the school no longer admits new students and after the training out of old students, anything can happen.
The school is headed by the wife of a traditional ruler in the state. Appointed in 2002, she has been on the saddle for the past 13 years.
The school’s problems
According to a source, “based on the school’s capacity when it was established, the Nursing Council of Nigeria pegged the school’s new intake to 50 students per session. But before the council’s directive stopping new students intake due to lack of infrastructure, there were allegations of admission racketeering to the effect that between 250 and 300 students were being admitted yearly, albeit through the back door. At present, the student population of the school is not known due to the alleged admission racketeering going on there.
It was also learnt that gaining admission into the school is one thing, passing out is another kettle of fish entirely. That is to say, no student can say as a matter of certainty how long they will stay in the school before graduating. “Most of the students spend between seven to 10 years for a programme that should have lasted for three years. To make matters worse, most of them do not graduate at last because their admission was not proper in the first place,” a source submitted.
An impeccable source said: “The practice in schools of nursing across the country is that after six months of admission, each student was expected to take what is called the Preliminary Training School (PTS) test. Anybody who fails to pass the exam is shown the way out, but those who passed go through what is called indexing and their names are sent to the Nursing Council of Nigeria as bona fide students of the school.
“But in the School of Nursing, Aba, because of the outrageous number of students that are admitted, it is only those who pay money that pass the exam and are indexed. This practice has made some of the students who were properly admitted but could not afford to pay their way through to remain in the school for upward of seven to 10 years. Some leave the school out of frustration”.
The source further disclosed: “The school was built in 1954 by the colonial masters. Past administrations in the state put up measures that allowed the school to move on but today, due to lack of infrastructure, the school has accreditation problem and because of this, the Nursing Council of Nigeria has directed that the school should no longer admit new students, that the old ones should be trained out and no one knows where this could lead to.”
It was also learnt that the problem of the school has gone beyond the shores of Nigeria as some students who attended the school and later went to other countries like the United States and UK encounter so many problems because of the difficulty in getting transcripts from their supposed alma mater. Of course, this affects their quest to continue their education abroad.
It was equally learnt that despite the fact that the Nursing Council of Nigeria had directed that there should be no fresh admission, admissions are still going on in the state. But what happens now is that those students that are admitted are placed in any of the classes where students are being trained out. The new intakes do not go through any preliminary training as they join older students midway; they do not take the mandatory PTS test.
Another source added: “It is believed that officials of the Nursing Council are compromised because whenever they are on visit to the school, they see some of these anomalies but they look the other way. All the Committees that are supposed to be running the school are non-functional. So, a top shot in the school use her relations and children to run the school. At times, she uses students who are in her good books to do administration work and index their fellow students which are not supposed to be so as this is purely the duty of lecturers.”
And like other civil and public service workers, personnel of the school are not paid as and when due. An employee of the of the school who pleaded anonymity volunteered: “We are owed seven months’ salary arrears and each time we want to go on strike, the management will invite the police who will arrest and lock up our leaders. The workers are not just passing through hell; we are living inside hell here on earth. How can you be working but at the end of the month you won’t have anything to show for it. ”
