More than a decade has passed, but a proposed cottage hospital in New Kutunku, Gwagwalada, meant to be completed within a year, has remained an abandoned structure despite significant investment and health benefits.
A resident, Bosede was elated when she learnt that the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA) had begun construction of the hospital there, but her joy was punctured years after the project failed to be completed.
She has given up on the hospital but her worries now is about her safety and that of her family members as the abandoned facility now houses criminals.
She said, “I know that if they build a hospital, it will surely help those who are sick and also help in emergencies. The government should try and complete the project since they already started it. The abandoned building has also led to many people hiding in the place and causing harm to people staying in that area.”
For the people of New Kuntunku, this facility was not just a structure; it was a lifeline and an economic booster. However, the initial excitement that surged through the community gradually faded into despair after contractors failed to appear on the site. Therefore as the years passed, residents watched in dismay how the building began to depreciate.
In 2010, precisely during the first early tenure of former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, the federal government proposed a cottage hospital project being spearheaded by the Health and Human Services Secretariat (works unit) of the FCDA.
The project, according to investigation was awarded to The Solid Concrete Nigeria Limited at a contract sum of N677 million (N677,879,466.60) on November 18, 2010, with the scope of the work being the construction of a 60-bed main hospital building.
The hospital was expected to comprise several wards, a theatre, a pharmacy, a laboratory, an accident & emergency unit, antenatal, and maternal and residential quarters.
Investigation reveals that the project commenced in February 2011 and was expected to be completed in 2012. However, as of 2012 when the then minister of FCT, Bala Mohammed, presented reports on the FCT projects to commemorate National Democracy Day 2012, the project has only reached 15 per cent.
Meanwhile, the budget allocations of the hospital project were not in public space as checks on Budget Office for the budgetary allocation to Federal Capital Territory projects between 2010-2015 did not include the details of the cottage hospital. This was despite some activities on the site.
It was gathered that the contractor was last seen on the site in 2020 during COVID-19, but the site has been visibly abandoned as there is no project office and plant of equipment on the site presently.
Site abandoned, now a farm
At the abandoned Cottage Hospital, situated at the back of the abattoir of the new Kutunku area, there are already five roofed and plastered buildings, consisting of two-storey buildings, one-storey building and two structures of what looks like a flat.
So far, some of the buildings had begun to peel away, while tiles in some of the structures were also confirmed to be in a bad state. The roof of one of the storey buildings was in tatters, depicting total neglect.
Shockingly, the hospital premises have been transformed into farmland and a fishing pond. The land that once served as a beacon of hope for the community is now utilised for agricultural activities.
A man who identified himself as Aliyu who claimed to be an engineer said he and other security men had to turn the site into a farmland due to its inactivity.
According to him, the hospital has been laid to waste for over three years now with no activity on the project, stressing that they keep the place secure and cultivate some farm products, just to show human activities on the site.
Another resident of the area Yahaya Bello explained that the project has been wasting away for years, with no health and economic benefits to the host communities, saying that bushes have taken over the hospital while part of the two-storey building has deteriorated.
“As you can see, the building houses bushes and all sorts of farm products. The hospital has since been abandoned and left to waste away for no reason. I do not understand how a project of this status would be abandoned by the government.”
Security concerns
Some residents in the community have voiced their concerns that the site poses a threat to the community’s safety as unauthorised individuals gain access to the premises.
Nuhu Talhanu, a resident said, “The government refused to continue with the project. They left this project after Goodluck administration left power. It has been eight years since he left and the project is still here. We are looking at the current administration to help us continue the hospital and finish the project. The hospital would help the people here.
“Since it’s uncompleted, we are having security issues. When it is nightfall, people enter into the uncompleted building. We are hoping for this current administration to help us with the hospital as everyone would be happy.”
Another resident, Hassan Lawal said, “If actually, it is a project that is meant for the benefit of humanity, it is meant to have been completed since, but unfortunately, I do not know what is hindering its completion.”
He stated that the project would significantly improve the socio-economic potency of the community if completed and put to use.
“If this project is completed, the socio-economic potency of this area would improve significantly because a facility like this is supposed to bring people across the country. If you look at the facility, you will understand that it is meant to accommodate more than 300 patients and you will see patients coming from Niger, Kaduna, Kogi and Kwara.”
Our women are dying- District Head
Amidst the growing concern over maternal mortality rate, the District Head of the area, Mohammed Sabiu, said they have lost many pregnant women during delivery due to long distance to Gwagwalada.
He said despite their attempts to draw attention to the dire need for a functioning hospital, their pleas have fallen on deaf ears, with the government seemingly unresponsive to their concerns.
“It has affected us so badly because sometimes, if our women want to deliver or have malaria, or whatever, especially pregnant women, before we get to the hospital, we lose many women.
“The hospital is far from here; we have to go to a specialist, and it’s about three kilometres away from this place. You know there’s a bad road and before we got to the hospital, some of them died.”
According to him, the community visited the former FCT minister’s office to complain about the long-abandoned hospital and was promised that the project would be completed, but has not seen any positive results.
“At the beginning of Buhari’s tenure, we went to the minister’s office and they promised us that. They later came to check the hospital, and since that time, we haven’t seen them again. The community has been trying their own, but the government is not listening to us.”
This situation mirrors other cases of maternal mortality in Nigeria. The World Health Organisation (WHO) in 2020 revealed that 788 women and children die per thousand in India, while 540 women and children per thousand die in Nigeria.
In its 2023 report, WHO also showed that there were a combined 4.5 million maternal, stillbirths and newborn deaths in 2020.
On the plausible causes of the mortality rate, the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) listed inadequate health facilities, shortage of critical human resources, inadequate power or water supply, commodity stock-outs, equipment inadequacy, weak standards/quality and very low demand for critical services primarily driven by the loss of confidence in the system as the causes.
FCDA hides project details/ reason for delayed completion
In an attempt to investigate the reason the project has been abandoned and uncompleted 13 years after it was awarded, despite meeting all the requirements stipulated under the Freedom of Information Act, the FCDA, has failed to respond.
Contractor evades scrutiny, shifts blame
The contractor, Solid Concrete Nigeria Limited, was subjected to a public search via the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) portal, but the result displayed three companies with similar names.
Even though the company’s name above was the contractor’s appellation as contained in the on-site signpost, the addresses therein were not of Kaduna but rather of Lagos, Bauchi and Benue states.
It is, however not clear if the company was delisted by CAC or didn’t register in the first place.
ICIR