The spokesman of the National Primary Health Care Development Agency, Sa’adu Salahu, has given notice of his retirement from the agency three months before it officially comes into effect.
His retirement, as he turns 60 this September, marks the end of a 19-year career shaping public perception of the agency and its work coordination primary health care nationwide.
NPHCDA faced intense public scrutiny over the years for coordinating immunisation to end polio and boost primary health, and the lack of public knowledge about its work fueled suspicion.
“When I joined the agency, in terms of public relations, it was zero,” Salahu said at a valedictory brief in Abuja.
“This is a medical agency and medical people are occupied with their technocracy. Apart from one quarterly magazine, there was nothing to know about the agency.”
NPHCDA has undergone reformation to become a global institution, whose worked helped Nigeria secured an extension to GAVI funding for routine immunisation.
Salahu, who started his career as a journalist in Kwara, thanked the media for “sustaining the reputation of the agency” while he ran its public relations unit.
NPHCDA executive director Faisal Shuaib said Salahu had been a “pillar of strength”. He said “The absence of such a pillar will necessarily mean the structure will not be whole.”
He noted the spokesman’s retirement evoked “sadness enveloped by fond memories of what he’d done in this agency.”
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