Oyo State government on Tuesday officially reacted to the death of an Ibadan based journalist, Olufemi Oluwajobi who died on Sunday 31st December 2017.
Oluwajobi who was until his death a newscaster and On Air Personality (OAP) with Ibadan based radio station owned by a gospel singer, Mr. Yinka Ayefele, Fresh FM, died after he was knocked down by a driver on his way to meet some friends at Ring Road area in Ibadan, the state capital.
The deceased was said to have been taken to Adeoyo Hospital, one of the state owned hospital after the accident.
It was alleged that the deceased was moved from Adeoyo Hospital due to lack of equipment and inability of those on duty to take care of him and was thereafter rushed to University College Hospital (UCH) where he was said to have died in the process.
The death of the journalist has attracted a lot of criticisms especially from the main opposition party in the state, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which decried the poor state of the Adeoyo hospital owned by the state government.
But the State Commissioner for Health, Dr.
Abdulazeez Adetuntan while reacting to various allegations that surrounded the circumstances that led to the death of the deceased at a press briefing Tuesday morning, declared that there was no need for the FM station to attack the government since the doctors and other staff of the hospital tried their best to save the deceased.
Adeduntan said “We are here to establish facts and figures and that is what we are trained to do.
I am not here to polish the government of Governor Abiola Ajimobi but to set the record straight on his achievements in the heath sector and on the various issues such as the death of a staff of Fresh FM.
That is why Governor Ajimobi brought me here.
“I will more or less encourage you to come to the ministry of health and ask us questions.
“I am ready to face any surgeon on the issue of the Fresh FM.
Adeduntan while speaking asked the FM station to blame the driver of the car that led to the death of the deceased instead of blaming the state government and the care giver that tried their best to revive the deceased.
He said “We did our best at Ring Road hospital. I would have expected Fresh FM to ask a surgeon to come and study this chart. Instead of blaming the driver that knocked this man, you are now blaming the care giver.
“Let us check our facts. I stand this morning to stand before any surgeon on this chart.
“Let Fresh FM go and call any surgeon in the one, a trained and certified one, Dr. Adeduntan will pay for it to come and read the chart”
Adeduntan while speaking further also declared that the achievements of the present administration in the state was second to none especially in the areas of eradication of polio, malaria among others.
He said no government in the state has achieved more that the present administration since the inception of the state.
Adeduntan said that the health insurance scheme which is the first in any state of the federation has about 40,000 clients already, noting that contrary to insinuation, the state hospitals are not mere consulting clinics but functional heath facilities.
He also disclosed that less than 100 million naira has so far been generated from the N50bn state heath endowment fund launched in August 2017.
