The Business Development Minister, Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal continues to support institutions and entrepreneurs to overcome their myriad challenges.
The latest to benefit from his generosity is the Tamale Nursing and Midwifery Training College where the Minister personally donated a 50KV standby generation plant.
This is to augment electricity power supply to the College which is Northern Ghana’s major health training institution.
On Monday December 28, 2020, Dr. Ibrahim Mohammed Awal handed over the plant to the management and said it was in fulfillment of his promise.
“When I visited the school the last time, the immediate complaint was lack of generator because the electricity here is not regular, it is erratic and sometimes when they have exams the light goes off and they have to start all over again. So, this generator is to build the capacity of the school and enable them to write their exams and avoid intermittent interruptions.”
He made another promise of a brand new pickup to strengthen effective monitoring and supervision.
He entreated future graduates to accept postings to deprived communities in the north where according to him; the nurse to patient ratio is appalling.
“The nurse to patient ratio is woefully inadequate in the north and the fact is that many of the trainees after graduation prefer working in peri-urban communities depriving the inhabitants of rural communities’ access to quality healthcare services.”
He reaffirmed government’s commitment to improve the health sector as Ghana is the on the path to attain Universal Health Coverage by 2030.
“The government of President Nana Akufo-Addo is so much committed to build the health status of the citizenry. The provision of affordable and quality healthcare services is very important to the President aside the flagship free senior high school policy.”
Principal of the Tamale Nursing and Midwifery Training College, Mr. Abdulai Abdul Malik commended the Business Development Minister for his benevolence.
“The Nursing and Midwifery Council Examination has gone online, it is no more a paper base examination and when they are writing the exams, the council prefers the ICT is on a plant and not the national grid because with the national grid there are interruptions that do not prompt even the VRA or NEDCo. With this plant, the electricity will be stable to power the internet facilities.”
He said infrastructure deficit remained the College’s major challenge and thereby appealed to government to more build hostels and lecture halls to increase enrollment.
“Let’s not forget the first batch of free SHS students just came out and the pass rate is very high so there is going to be pressure during our next intake.”
