By Allieu Sahid Tunkara
Freetown City Council yesterday handed over the Allen Town Health centre to community authorities after refurbishment.
One of the community elders who chaired the ceremony, Alhassan Kanu, said the facility had collapsed seven years ago “due to neglect by government”.
He described the event as “epoch-making,” saying that the community people had made personal donations to the reconstruction project. He said the reconstruction was part of government’s efforts at devolvingits activities, adding that the idea of decentralisation was aimed at bringing governance to local communities.
“It is rather unfortunate that we are handing over the health centre at a time when the country is faced with a dangerous health threat, the Ebola Virus Disease,” he said.
Mayor of the Freetown Municipality, Franklin Bode Gibson, said they had made a budgetary allocation of Le 95 million while the community people donated Le 100 million to completing the project.
He said the community had been deprived of a health centre for a long time and urged the community people to continue paying their taxes so that the council could deliver essential services to them.
He thanked the community people for their efforts in making the health centre operational.
In his keynote address deputy minister of local government, Hadiru Kalokoh, said FCC had responded “positively to the distress call of the community health officer regarding the deplorable condition of the health centre.”
He referred to the Ebola Virus Disease as an “invisible enemy that has attacked the country.” He cautioned the community people to stop running away from hospitals if they experienced signs and symptoms of Ebola in order to reduce the risk of spreading the disease.
District medical officer, Dr. Thomas Samba, who represented the minister of health, commended the mayor for his leadership. Dr. Samba warned traditional healers to refrain from administering treatment to suspected Ebola patients because a lot of them had died trying to heal people.
“Now that we have got back our health centre, we will ensure that we deploy the right personnel so that they can help the community,” he promised.
(C) Politico 02/10/14
