The Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr. Iziaq Adekunle Salako, has urged Nigerian doctors and other health professionals to strengthen professional discipline, accountability, ethical conduct and collaboration to improve the country’s health system. Salako made the call while delivering the Guest of Honour Address at the opening……
The Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr. Iziaq Adekunle Salako, has urged Nigerian doctors and other health professionals to strengthen professional discipline, accountability, ethical conduct and collaboration to improve the country’s health system.
Salako made the call while delivering the Guest of Honour Address at the opening of the National Executive Council (NEC) meeting of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) in Abuja on Wednesday.
The meeting, held at Barcelona Hotel, Wuse II, Abuja, has as its theme, “Transforming Healthcare Practice in Nigeria: Building Trust, Accountability and Collaborative Excellence.”
The minister, who described himself as both a member of government and a practising medical doctor, said the theme was particularly relevant to ongoing efforts to reform the health sector.
He said trust in healthcare must be earned through consistent professional conduct, measurable performance and accountability to patients, colleagues, employers and the wider public.
“Trust is not a speech; it is a record,” Salako said.
Highlighting the Federal Government’s efforts under the Nigeria Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative and its Compact with the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, he said implementation of key indicators under the Compact stood at 84 per cent following the 2025 Joint Annual Review.
He added that 35 states and the FCT had completed their Joint Annual Reviews and Performance Dialogues.
Salako also disclosed that the health sector’s share of the national budget had risen to 5.2 per cent, while funding for the Basic Health Care Provision Fund (BHCPF) increased from N131.5 billion in 2024 to N299 billion in 2026.
According to him, the increased investment had resulted in direct financing for more than 8,000 primary healthcare facilities, the upgrading of nearly 4,000 primary healthcare centres and increased utilisation of facilities supported by the fund.
On maternal and newborn health, the minister said the 172 highest-burden Local Government Areas recorded a 17 per cent reduction in maternal deaths and a 12 per cent reduction in newborn deaths under the Maternal Mortality Reduction Innovation Initiative.
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He added that more than 48,000 women had received free emergency obstetric care, while over 4,000 free Caesarean sections had been performed in NHIA-empanelled facilities.
More than 4,700 women, he said, had also received free vesico-vaginal fistula repairs across 207 facilities.
On workforce development, Salako said more than 37,000 workers had been recruited into federal tertiary hospitals since 2024, with approximately 75 per cent of them in the clinical cadre.
He said special allowances for health workers had also been increased, while incentives, including the Medical Residency Training Fund, were being implemented.
The minister added that annual medical school admission quotas had been doubled from approximately 5,000 to 10,000.
He further disclosed that N110 billion had been committed through TETFund for the rehabilitation of 18 medical, dental, pharmacy and nursing training institutions.
He said the National Policy on Health Workforce Migration had also been adopted to provide a structured response to health-worker migration.
Salako acknowledged the government’s ongoing engagement with doctors and other health professionals on welfare and workplace concerns, citing the August 4, 2026 meeting with the leadership of the National Association of Resident Doctors.
He assured the NMA that the government would continue to engage constructively with the association and its affiliates, while urging the profession to reciprocate with a strong commitment to ethical practice and patient-centred care.
However, Salako challenged the medical profession to recognise that “trust is a two-way covenant,” stressing that patients experience the health system through their encounters with healthcare professionals rather than through budgetary allocations.
He urged the NMA to treat professional conduct as a strategic asset, warning that absenteeism, informal payments, diversion of public patients to private facilities and other unethical practices could undermine public confidence.
“Every naira we invest in the health sector can become discounted by those encounters if the highest sense of duty is not exhibited,” he said.
On accountability, Salako said the government was strengthening systems that make performance measurable and public, including the Sector-Wide Approach, Joint Annual Reviews and Performance Dialogues, direct facility financing, and the deployment of National Health Fellows and Public Financial Management Officers across the 774 Local Government Areas.
He disclosed that the ministry was also implementing a Ministerial Oversight Committee for the BHCPF involving subnational governments, development partners, civil society and the private sector.
According to him, the ministry had voluntarily invited the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) to participate in its monitoring mechanisms.
Salako called on the medical profession to embrace stronger clinical governance through effective mortality and morbidity reviews, honest maternal and perinatal death surveillance, monitoring of waiting times and consultant availability, and credible disciplinary processes.
He also disclosed that the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) had screened more than 7,000 shops and removed 87 truckloads of falsified, banned and expired medical products valued at about N1 trillion from open drug markets in Aba, Onitsha and Lagos.
On quackery, the minister urged doctors to take a leading role in combating the practice and called for a standing joint anti-quackery mechanism involving the ministry, NMA, Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria, NAFDAC and security agencies.
He said NMA state branches should serve as a critical surveillance layer in the fight against quackery.
Addressing recent social media reports alleging an organ-harvesting syndicate in parts of the FCT, Salako said the ministry was paying close attention to the matter.
He disclosed that the National Tertiary Health Institutions Standard Committee had developed National Standards and Guidelines for Organ/Tissue Transplantation, which require informed consent from donors and recipients, facility certification and prohibit commercialisation.
He said relevant agencies and parastatals had been directed to support the Nigeria Police in investigating the allegations and establishing the facts.
On task-shifting and task-sharing, Salako stressed that the government’s policy was designed to expand access to healthcare while maintaining patient safety.
He urged professional groups to resolve scope-of-practice disagreements through institutional and regulatory mechanisms rather than media confrontations or industrial actions that could compromise patient care.
The minister proposed reciprocal commitments between the government and NMA, saying government should be held accountable for honouring its commitments and the collective bargaining process, sustaining increased health financing, protecting health workers at their duty posts through appropriate legislation, expanding training capacity while maintaining accreditation standards and ensuring the NMA has a meaningful voice in health workforce and scope-of-practice decisions.
In return, he urged the NMA to strengthen institutional discipline against unethical conduct, ensure industrial action remained a genuine last resort with emergency services protected, lead anti-quackery efforts at state and local levels, and promote inter- and intra-professional respect and ethical conduct.
Salako said healthcare transformation could not be achieved by government alone or against the wishes of doctors and other health professionals.
“We can go on measuring each other’s failures with great precision, or we can be measured together by the only indicator that matters: whether the Nigerian who walks into a health facility tomorrow is treated with dignity, gets the care he requires without being impoverished, walks out alive and better than when he walked in,” he said.
The minister commended the NMA President, Dr. (Prof.) Afekhide Ernest Omoti, the National Officers Committee, the Local Organising Committee and Nigerian doctors for their contributions to healthcare development, and wished the NEC meeting successful deliberations.
