By Agar Mayor Gai-Makoon
“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health is the most shocking and inhumane,’’ Martin Luther King jr.
Many people understand politics as the acquisition and exercise of power, but they fail to grasp it that the end goal is social and economic transformation. Social change is the sole role of political leaders and parties. But politics gets a different understanding when political decisions do not bring the change that people need. Every society demands good healthcare, better education and better infrastructure among other services from their government, but the fact that there are political decisions that just do the opposite weakens the relevance of real politics in South Sudan. And for that matter, politics that ends with only acquisition and exercise of power is deadly for a young nation. It is a grave threat to our growing healthcare system and the populace.
Today(yesterday), I bring to your notice what is happening in Yirol East County, Lakes state, particularly in the health sector. A few months ago, the national Ministry of Health, in a move to provide the needed quality of health in counties, up-graded thirty health facilities to phccs, county hospitals, civil hospital or special units. Yirol East has Kush hospital, Adior upgraded as the county hospital in the list. The decision by the national ministry to elevate Adior primary health care center to a county hospital is not a surprise to many people in the county owing to its services that the people have enjoyed for more than thirty decades. It is the most senior health facility in the county with established infrastructure and conducive environ that has made it excelled in delivering the needed health services over the years. The national ministry of health and the donor agencies have made their health plans realizable for the people of Yirol East through this health facility. Adior hospital is situated in the Kush area within Adior, far east payam of Yirol East County. The county administrative headquarters is in Nyang, a fifteen-minute drive from Yirol town. On his recent visit for the inauguration of newly renovated maternal ward building in Kush hospital, the state minister of Health, Lakes state, Jacob Kok announced his decision to make Nyang phcc the county hospital, and not Kush (Adior) hospital that was announced by the national ministry. The community of Yirol East County has not welcomed his decision and call on the national ministry to intervene and make sure that the health needs of the people are provided effectively. The decision made by the minister emanates from two reasons. Firstly, because Nyang is the county administrative capital. It is true that the seat of county administration is in Nyang, but it has nothing to do with distribution of services. South Sudan has a decentralized system of governance where each and every area deserves presence and control over services in their area. All the areas of the county and the people of Yirol East deserve equal social services. It does not require politics of power and sectional influence to make decisions that concern social services such as health. Otherwise, the people suffer from such political decisions that seek to fulfil political interests. Nyang and the payams around it are closer to Yirol town than Adior and Malek payams. When there is a health emergency in Nyang, it is easier to have quick intervention from Yirol civil hospital. It means that Yirol East is wholly safe when Adior hospital remains as the county hospital because it serves the health needs of the far east payams of Adior and Malek. The national ministry of health was judicious enough in making such a decision and it has to be upheld.
Secondly, the decision by the state minister has recipe of influence from specific individuals. Jacob Kok was well aware of the processes that led to the upgrading of health facilities right from the start. And given his position as the custodian of health for all the people in Lakes state, the decision to improve health services in the county through elevating Adior hospital to new status was not a bad idea for him. But the people who see health through different lenses were able to mislead him into making such messy decision. The minister should revise himself and see that he has been driven away from his stand as a health professional, and a minister that has the mandate to deliver to all the people.
Politics should only guide, and not direct and make health-based decisions. The donor agencies, the national ministry of health and Lakes state government headed by General Rin Tueny Mabor should call on the state minister of Health to repeal his decision. The National Health Policy 2016-2026 and other plans by the National Ministry of Health can only be helpful to the people of Lakes state when the state health sector is organized, independent and free from toxic external influence.
The writer has a background in Socio-Political Philosophy. He studies Medicine in Egypt