Stakeholders Divided as Senate Pushes for New Malaria Eradication Agency

By James Adamu, Abuja

Stakeholders in the health sector have disagreed over the proposal by the Senate to establish a National Agency for Malaria Eradication.

The stakeholders disagreed in Abuja on Thursday during a public hearing on the bill sponsored by Senator Ned Nwoko (APC, Delta-North), seeking to establish the agency.

First to kick against establishing a fresh agency for the eradication of Malaria in Nigeria was the Chief State Counsel in the Federal Ministry of Justice, Imarha Reuben. He argued that creating such an agency would be a duplication of already existing ones and run contrary to implementation of Steve Orosanye report on realignment of public agencies and parastatals.

He told the session, “The Federal Ministry of Justice is against the National Agency for Malaria Eradication (Establishment) Bill 2025, SB 172, to avoid a duplication of functions of existing similar agencies in line with implementation of the Orosanye report.”

Also kicking against the proposed agency, the Chairman, Malaria Technical Working Group in Nigeria, Dr Kolawole Maxwel, argued that rather than establishing an eradication agency, government at all levels in the country should come up with concerted efforts for the total elimination of Malaria.

He recommended, “We recommend that the current eradication target should be changed to elimination.

“We are also suggesting that the malaria programme should be housed within a coordinated government structure to avoid fragmentation and for easy coordination.

“If malaria is taken out as an agency, it leads to another fragmentation of the health sector.”

A representative of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Fraden Bitrus, suggested that concerted efforts towards eradication of Malaria needed to be strengthened but they should not involve the creation of a new agency.

But, the President of Environmental Health Officers Association, FCT Chapter, Ismaila Haruna Dankogi, backed the move for the establishment of the proposed agency.

According to him, the proposed agency will help the country to change its approach of dealing with malaria from a curative to a preventive one.

Also speaking, the Executive Director of Community Vision Initiative, Dr Chioma Amajoh, strongly supported the move for establishment of the agency.

Explaining her stance, she said it would serve as a required springboard for coordinated actions against Malaria .

Dr Amajoh, who is fondly called ‘Mama Malaria’, passionately appealed to the committee to allow the proposal see the light of day, adding, “Clinical case management of Malaria in Nigeria over the decades, has failed to tame the scourge.”

President of the Senate , Godswill Akpabio, in a remark to open to hearing, noted, “It is time to move from seasonal campaigns to institutionalized eradication, backed by law, science, and accountability.”

Senator Ipalibo Banigo (Rivers-West), who chaired the session, thanked all the stakeholders for their inputs into the proposed legislation, assuring them that the Senate would do justice to their contributions.