A constitutional and human rights lawyer, Ikenna Ahumibe, has issued a formal call for comprehensive healthcare reforms, accusing the federal government of constitutional failure in its obligation to provide adequate medical care to Nigerians and warning that the combination of underfunding, doctor emigration, and deteriorating infrastructure had placed millions of lives at risk.
In a statement addressed to President Bola Tinubu, Ahumibe said access to healthcare was not a luxury but a fundamental right enshrined in the 1999 Constitution, and that the government’s failure to protect and fulfil that right constituted a dereliction of its most basic duty to citizens.
He noted that with only approximately 4.2 percent of the 2026 national budget allocated to healthcare, Nigeria’s investment remained manifestly below international benchmarks and insufficient to address the structural decay afflicting public health institutions. He cited the ongoing exodus of medical professionals as a compounding crisis, driven by poor remuneration, unpaid salaries, inadequate infrastructure, and insecurity that had seen dozens of doctors kidnapped annually.
Ahumibe said approximately $550 million was lost annually to medical tourism, with roughly 5,000 Nigerians travelling abroad monthly for treatment at an average cost of between $20,000 and $40,000 per trip. He described conditions at the National Hospital Abuja and the Federal Medical Centre Owerri as falling below constitutional standards, citing shortages of MRI machines, dialysis units, and cancer treatment equipment at the former, and patients admitted in corridors at the latter in conditions that violated the constitutional guarantee of human dignity.
He called on Health Minister Professor Ali Pate to revamp health institutions urgently and urged the National Assembly to act decisively in the public interest rather than engage in practices that undermined governance integrity.
