10 Ways Samtoo Hospital Would Have Been Alternatively useful to Imo People

ONWUASOANYA FCC JONES

Yesterday, Uzodimma’s bulldozers revved up to life, rarely. But unlike in the days of Okorocha when the sound of bulldozers and earthmoving machines would mean new developments and opening up of formerly non-existent roads and clearing forests to site new schools, new markets, new offices, new hospitals and other beneficial projects for the people and the State, Uzodimma’s bulldozers make ominous sounds, because they wreck havoc, plunder tax payers money and underdevelop the State.

Like always, Uzodimma’s numerous shit-packers were handy to provide excuses for such reckless wreck of people’s resources. Uncoordinated as always, a gang in the Hopist lying machine said the hospital was demolished because its location wasn’t fit to locate a hospital, others said the hospital had become a hideout for criminals and hooligans, hence, a security risk to the State, while another gang came up with the false narrative that the hospital was structurally defective. Yet, there was another pathetic lot who shamelessly claimed that there was no hospital named Somtoo hospital in Owerri.

For the pathetically lost lot who claimed that there was no hospital at the former Ekeonunwa market because the structure had no medical equipment, personnel or patients: a hospital starts from the construction of the building, then acquisition of equipment and hiring of personnel. Okorocha’s administration completed the first stage of setting up this hospital by securing the site, clearing it and erecting a magnificent structure that would housed the biggest hospital, East of the Niger. It is a failure on the part of the two men who succeeded Okorocha that they allowed this and many other structures and hospitals initiated by the Okorocha administration to lie to waste. That structure is almost two years since its completion and for these years it has been abandoned and the government had encouraged urchins to invade the building, loot any movable furniture, aluminum fittings, doors, electrical fittings, and other accessories that they could lay their hands on.

No matter what excuse or revisionism the Hopist gang may come up, it has recorded in the consciousness of Imolites and Nigerians at large that Chief Hope Uzodimma is an expert at destruction and amateur in construction. And this is a very bad reputation to add to the already, not too good reputation our governor had before now.

For record purposes, Okorocha administration is acclaimed to have built more than 2000 structures in the State in its eight years in power, and apart from the Prince and Princess Hotel Okigwe and about three other such structures that collapsed in the early days of his administration, all other buildings erected by Okorocha has remained solid till date.

But, with all the excuses the Hope Uzodimma government has been able to come up with so far, nothing plausible could be said to have been put forward as reason for draining hundreds of millions of Naira of Imo funds. It also made it obvious that the government is bereft of ideas and is surrounded by men and women who either do not wish the government well or lack the capacity to think. Let me as an Imo son and Party man, outline some ways the government would have handled this situation without having to pull down that magnificent 1000 beds hospital. Some of my ideas are:

1. The government could have done some finishing touches on the hospital, equipped it and made it functional, at least it would have become a major achievement for the Hope Uzodimma administration.
2. The hospital rooms and various offices could have been turned to shops in order to meet with the Hope Uzodimma administration’s plan of restoring the Ekeukwu market to its original place. A few redesigns and reconstructions here and there would have still achieved the same purpose.
3. The hospital building could have been converted to a market for patent medicine dealers. We could have replicated the ‘Ogbo Ogwu’ Onitsha, which is one of the most thriving businesses in Onitsha and rakes in billions in revenue monthly.
4. The governor could have cleared off the miscreants who had taken over the building, cleaned it up and used it as an office for the Ministry of Trade and Investment or for Commerce and Industry.
5. The hospital could have been converted to a world class ICT hub for budding coders in Imo State, or even an ordinary Computer and GSM village, that would rival the popular and billion dollar worth Ikeja Computer Village.
6. Imo could have become the first State in Nigeria to have a pharma market. that hospital could have been turned to a one stop medical or pharmaceutical market, where medical equipment would be sold, laboratory test conducted and drugs sold, too.
7. The hospital could have been leased out to private health investors to bring it to life, thereby, generating good revenue for the government as well as providing healthcare services to the people at subsidized rate, while creating hundreds of job opportunities for Imolites.
8. The place could have been converted to Imo fashion house, where local tailors and dealers on fabrics would be centered. This would encourage healthy competition among these fashion designers, thereby improving their trade and also putting Owerri on a good stead to rival Aba tailors’ renowned ingenuity in fashion designing.
9. Those massive structures could have also been creatively altered to become another big primary or secondary school at the center of the city, like the Owerri City School built by Okorocha.
10. The structure could have been ceded to Owerri Nchi-ise or Owerri Municipal LGA, to convert it to any useful communal purpose. I know Owerri people are ingenious and that structure would have generated billions of Naira to them and the State in few years.

NB: The good thing about all these, is that the governor could have as well achieved his vindictive aim of trying to erase Okorocha’s signature on the project by naming any of these alternative projects after himself, his children, his wife or his girlfriends.