Could we meet you Sir, tell us, who is Dr.Ikenna
Ugwu, what prompted your desire to vie for NOA Assistant Secretary?
My name is Dr.Ugwu Ikenna .I was born into the Ugwu’s Family in Amechi Awkunanaw , Enugu
south Local government area, Enugu state.I did my Primary education at Uwani River
Primary school Enugu.I had my secondary education in CIC Enugu. I studied Optometry
in Abia State University(ABSU). I did my national youth service in Delta state
and I won the Governor’s Honors award as the best Youth Corp member and was
given automatic employment by the state government of Chief James Ibori.I am
now a Principal Optometrist and head of Optometry unit in Central Hospital,
Agbor. I have Post graduate degree in Commuity Eye Health from UCT, South
Africa. I am married to an alumnus of Abia state university and God blessed our
marriage with children. I enjoy reading .
How would you make the changes you desire in
NOA to come to pass?
The main desire that prompted me to come out for this
election is to see how we can use our strength to actualize the dream of our founding fathers. I discovered that the leadership of
NOA is distant from Optometrists. For
instance Optometrists in Delta state have problems and yet no member of the executive
visited them to know and help tackle the issue. This problem lingered for years until the people
that caused the problem made it a national, which is the twenty fourth point of their present demands from the government. Phone calls, SMS etc can never be compared to on the spot assessment . Medical Lab scientist had
problem in one Hospital in Delta state ,it took their national exco three days
to visit the hospital. I want to see how national exco can get to states with
problems, I mean prompt visitation. Secondly, I have been the President of National
Association Of Enugu State Student in ABSU, I have been NOSA Electoral Committee chairman, I have been the Assistant
Secretary of Delta state chapter . I have been secretary of numerous committees
in NOA Delta State. I am presently the chairman of Association of Optometrists
in Public Service in Nigeria(AOSPN) Delta state chapter. I have experience and
want to offer this for the service of NOA to move Optometry forward.
"I discovered that the leadership of NOA is distant from Optometrists. For instance Optometrists in Delta state have problems and yet no member of the executive visited them to know and help tackle the issue. This problem lingered for years until the people that caused the problem made it a national, which is the twenty fourth point of their present demands from the government. Phone calls, SMS etc can never be compared to on the spot assessment . "
The task of taking optometry to enviable heights can only
be done by you and I. In addition to my constitutional role as Assistant Secretary,
I will see how I can use my presence in the exco to propose that we conduct survey and get a complete
list of all the states, their problem and the
extent the problem have been solved, all areas will be included. This will
help Exco and Optometrists know the problems
and gains seen in certain areas at a
glance. This will help us plan well. I also intend to propose to the exco on the need for intelligence unit for NOA. Other
Health care unions especially NMA and AMLSCN have this unit. They will gather information on things concerning Optometry
from various Ministries of Health, House of Assemblies, Senate,etc. We know
that information is power, so this unit is important if we must be above our
enemies. These unions mentioned use
unemployed members and pay stipends to
them to encourage them .Have you asked why in some states they don’t even want
optometrists to come near Ministry of Health? Umaru Dikko and British
government were saved from huge embarrassment by a single phone call from Umaru
Dikko’s clerk. Just one txt message can save us. We must start listening to
members.
For a long time now, NOA is yet to get a
secretariat, how do you intend to cope with this or bring a desired change,
since you are vying to be the secretary?
I
intend to have a make use of our rented secretariat and also
have mobile secretariat .The advent of technologies will enable me to do my job without any hindrance.
This will not cause any problem at all. We can also have zonal offices that
will act like zonal secretariat. It does
not mean we will pay for new building .We can use state secretariats in each of the zones .These proposals are
subject to modification. Finally I can
do my job as Assistant Secretary from anywhere but it is good we now have a
secretariat because will help to give Optometrists easy access to N.O.A
and Optometric information.
What are the areas of weaknesses you have
identified in Optometry teaching, learning, practice and improvements as a
profession. How do you intend to tackle them?
Optometry teaching is improving because of new
challenges such as residency and masters
in different fields of optometry .There
is need to improve on our research
because there is nothing like evidence based facts. We need grants to go
into some research .We can make use of facts we get from researches for
optometric advocacy .Optometric learning to me is dwindling these days. This is a general problem in the
whole country because education have been thrown down. People are now more
interested in wealth. Our interns and
youth corp members now think of money first. I support them to seek better
wages but it should not be number one on their list. Optometry practice can be
divided into two. Those in private practice that make up large percentage of
optometrists and those in public service. Private practioners gave optometry
the good name it now has, before the influx of Optometrist to public service
because then the number of optometrists were few and those in private sector were enjoying limited monopoly, but now the number have
increased and the competition is very
stiff. We need to look at a way to
increase the client base of private practitioners. In legal profession, there
are certain things those that work in government leave for those in private to
do. They made it law so that those in government will leave certain jobs for those in private sector.
What I mean is that the state counsel cannot be lawyer on certain cases for
individual, the individual must get a lawyer in private practice, these
proposals can be modified to suit everybody in NOA. Public service is a different
ball game. Yes there are improvements because we now have optometrists working in
general hospitals,teaching hospitals and their likes, but it have not been easy
for many of them. They are treated like second class citizens in these
hospitals. These problems is hydra headed and differs from A to B and C. We need
to do a comprehensive survey of these problems and map them out against map of
Nigeria .The biggest problem we noticed in public service is implementation of
our approved circulars not approval of circulars. We need to acknowledge these things then we will know
how to get around them. As you know the system you use in state ‘A’ might not work in ‘B’, so it
requires different approaches. We need to see how we will bring more
optometrists into civil service. Dentists have reached advanced stage toward employing Dentists in health centers throughout
the country. We had this proposal before them but they were faster than us. We
should as a matter of urgency renew our lobby for this because if it sails
through, it will change the face of optometry in the country..As the chairman
of AOSPN in Delta state we are trying something new to see how to correct the
wrong done to our members in term of
certain allowance, it has reached advanced stage. It is my personal opinion
that when all advocacy fail after so many trials and years especially on cases
with legal backings ,we should be courageous enough to use the court to get our
right. The task is just too much,but if we get it right in Asaba by getting the
right people into leadership position of NOA,then we will be sure that we have
started our journey in the right direction. As you know the health
sector is on fire now and if they succeed in killing those in public service they will surely move to
private practioners. This is our chance to stand on iron feet not clay feet.
"As you know the health sector is on fire now and if they succeed in killing those in public service they will surely move to private practioners. This is our chance to stand on iron feet not clay feet.
Critics are of the view that you are outspoken and forward, what is your take on that?
Critics are important part of democracy, and if you want
to improve , you must ask God to provide them if you don’t have one. I am happy
I have them too. Yes I am outspoken
because I hate injustice and will fight injustice to the last drop of blood in
my body .If we want to move forward in NOA we must tell ourselves the truth and
not what we want to hear. In things concerning Optometry . Mandela was imprisoned for more than 20yrs for standing
for the truth, but today South Africans are enjoying because Mandela did not
sell the truth. We need someone who will stand for optometry even if he is the
only one standing. It is not true that I am too forward and that I am not
diplomatic. I am in fact diplomatic .I will give you few practical examples. Students
from UNIBEN do come to our various hospitals for solo practice, but when our
internship was approved by the Governor , a particular health care profession
did not like it, they stop it at the point of implementation. Then
ophthalmologist s using this as a catalyst also moved against students doing
solo practice in Hospitals in Delta state. In fact one of them openly chased
out optometry students doing solo practice in the hospital she worked in broad
daylight. The problem also cameup in my Hospital. I went to my MD then and
explained the situation to him, he sympathized with me but said since
internship was stopped he will not allow any type of training in our hospital. I
told him that those students are my visitors. He said okay, but they cannot be
visiting every day, we had a long discussion and at the end of the day students
continued their solo practice in my unit. Even our
equipment that was pocketed by the head of our department was given to us by one MD when I told him that for me to do comprehensive report on
his brother I need to see our inventory to know equipment we have there
that I can use. I used that opening to
get back all our equipment that the HOD locked in a room, which he refused to
give us to use neither was he using them .Diplomacy is good,I love it, I use it
but like everything on earth it has limitations too. To be able to know where
diplomacy ends is important so that you
can try other methods. We know people define the same thing differently, for
example the cup is half filled and the cup is half empty. I believe they might
be seeing some qualities in me but defined them differently. I am not a saint and I am not perfect, so I know I still need to improve on one or two things. Secondly, we learn
every day and we work according to the immediate situation for example, if
there is violent demonstration somewhere, you first of all stop the riot before
going for round table talk.
"Yes I am outspoken because I hate injustice and will fight injustice to the last drop of blood in my body .If we want to move forward in NOA we must tell ourselves the truth and not what we want to hear. In things concerning Optometry "
What is your view as regards NOA stance in the current JOHESU-NMA
agitations in the health sector?
My dear, I don’t know NOA stance on JOHESU and NMA crisis
but what I know is that NMA said that they want our call duty allowance to be
slashed to 2% and from there they will demand that it gets to zero call duty allowance. You know they did
this in Delta state and succeeded now they want to make it a national policy. That
is why I laugh at those Optometrists that are hiding information from their
fellow optometrists because they feel they
are okay. Asyou can see they are now making our call duty number 24 of
their demand. We in Delta state are not relenting, Using AOPSON , dragged them
to Public Complaint Commission and we are the awaiting result. Christ said if
they are not against us ,then they are for us. JOHESU is not against us and we
stand to benefit by joining like forces like them. We are not large enough to be alone. I will like us to
join JOHESU or Assembly of Health care Professional Associations(AHPA). Most of
the problem we have today is because
we are orphans in unionism. NOA is supposed to be like
NMA,NBA,AMLSN,PSN, in other words, a professional
cum pressure group. Even God said, it is not good for man to be alone. Am I communicating?
Yes you are..okay, what would you do differently from your
predecessors in NOA?
The main thing I will do is to bring governance closer to
ALL optometrists. Optometrists full share holders in NOA because they pay dues that run NOA, any person
elected should see himself as their servant. There is need to increase
transparency and accountability. Optometrists should also show more zeal in the
affairs of NOA. They should be made to hold their officers accountable. What I
am saying is that this change on what I would have done is two ways-bringing governance
to the people and urging Optometrists to make their officers accountable to
them. Thanks.
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