Pat Utomi To Political Leaders: We Can Save Ourselves, Shape The Future Of Our Children

Prof. Pat Utomi has urged political leaders to reconsider the nation’s political direction and the future of young Nigerians.

Utomi made this remark at the inaugural meeting of the Working Council of the New Tribe’s Health Care Cohort.
“to map and guide a rebirth of healthcare in Nigeria, as a cohort of our New Tribe designed to assist citizens in reclaiming and shaping a country of promise that politicians have left in ruins.”

According to him, “it became quite clear that Nigerians have become a global tribe that can aggregate the good of the world in which they have thrived no matter the constraints in their path into a new age for all its people, reduced sadly a country of pity as the poverty capital of the world by lack of leadership, a collapse of culture, and the embrace of emotion over reason, leaving society a victim of the absence of rational public conversation.”

“It is not by chance that you, the health care cohort’s leadership council, are the first to be armed with your mandate to go out there and confound doubters with a moral compass that will produce results that the world will talk about for a long time. Health care and education have long been regarded as critical to man’s liberation from the bonds of misery.

“I am so proud of this day because it is a time when your collective talents serve as a platform for showcasing the triumph of the human spirit as initiatives stemming from your genius and compassion solve problems for both the affluent and the poorest of the poor as they work to improve the quality of life in our land.”

Utomi recalled that many years ago, he arrived at Bisi Onabanjo University Medical School in Sagamu to speak at an event for students from the CVL club “I had founded,” led by Tolu Ademujimi. The speaker, then LUTH provost, concluded his remarks by stating that the Nigerian health-care system was a “man-made disaster.”
One of the primary goals of this cohort is to reverse the damage that man has done to Nigerian health care.
Who are we to dare, and why are we so determined to establish a new order?

“Some years ago, two Columbia University economists, Arvind Subramanian and Xavier Sala-i-Martin, suggested in an IMF working paper that Nigeria would be better off without a government because the welfare effect of oil income if shared equally with all Nigerians was greater than the outcome of governing Nigeria in the manner it is governed.

“It therefore makes sense for citizens to try to take back their country by creating greater welfare-advancing opportunities in the absence of government.” How are we going about this? We now turn to the wisdom of ancient Greece.

“According to the Greeks, people who think only of themselves are at the root of civilization. This category was referred to as idiots. Moving on, there is the next category, which cares for others but only those with whom they share parochial ties such as blood, language, and religion. They called them tribesmen. For tribesmen, anyone who is not a member of their tribe is an enemy to be fought fiercely.

“Those who feel a shared humanity and solidarity with other people, regardless of geography, belong to a higher category of people in society. They referred to these individuals as citizens.

“Our goal is to build a moral tribe of citizens who speak and live personal integrity, value the dignity of the human person, celebrate work ethic and entrepreneurial creativity, and believe in merit with inclusion as the essence of the social order in which we recognise that I am because we are.

“To put the vision into action, this new tribe has formed two sets of cohorts in a cluster of 14 and seven for sectors of intervention and mode of organisation, respectively.

“Just as we are presenting our brief for the healthcare cohort today, others for education, values, public accountability, election reforms, and so on will follow.

“Our preliminary findings indicate that your cohort strategy will include the deployment of an app that we are currently finalising that will allow physicians all over the world to donate two or three hours per week to see patients remotely. Massive health education and disease prevention initiatives, as well as support for Health Care Malls and Upend Hospital Clusters, will be part of your strategy.

“The proposed cohort’s Congress is made up of all volunteers, healthcare professionals, technical support, and administrative types. They will serve as the backbone of debates and rational discussion on the two portals presented to us today, as well as the boots on the ground. Their contributions serve as feedstock for the leadership council you have formed. Four co-chairs will guide the cohort. This council, which includes a mental health specialist, a cardiologist, home care entrepreneurs, chemists, nursing leaders and a physiotherapist, is led by two male physicians in Atlanta and California and two female physicians in Abuja and Kano respectively. I want to pay special tribute to Dr. Abiodun Olatidoye, who we propose will chair the co-chaos, Dr. Iheanacho Emeruwa, Dr. Zainab Bagudu, and RN Zahrau Ibrahim.
Pat Utomi concluded, “I wish you all God’s grease on your elbows as you show that it is possible.”