…Dispels Rumour About Immunization, Launches 2025
By Mohammed Abubakar Dutse
The Emir of Dutse, in Jigawa state, Alhaji Hamim Nuhu Sanusi has dispelled wide-spread misconception surrounding immunization, in the northern part of the country.
The monarch made the declaration while flagging off the 2025 routine immunization to cover the seven LGAs of his emirate in Jiba a rural community in Dutse local government insisting that contrary to the claims in some quarters regarding the harmful nature of immunization it was indeed a life saver.
The occasion also coincided with the foundation-laying ceremony of Primary Healthcare Post to provide basic healthcare services to the people of the community.
Tugged in the one of the- hard-to- reach communities under Kudai Ward, about 10 kilometres from Dutse the state capital, investigations have shown that the village is one of the communities whose inhabitants historically resisted the immunization.
Both Shehu Sambo, the Executive Secretary of Jigawa State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, (PHCDA) and Chairman of Dutse local government council, Dr. Sibu Abdullahi, who in their separate comments confirmed the resistance of residents of the community to routine immunizations in the past, attributed the action on the non- availability of primary medical facility in the community.
But their monarch, who allayed fears of the people towards immunization said, as their leader, who would approve of something that is harmful to his own people.
According to him, “I want to draw your attention to the ongoing immunization, we will not approve of something that will harm you because we’re because you’re there, there will be no us without you. You’re our pride, so anything we bring to you, I believe is something that will help all of us together”.
The monarch recalled that in the days of his father, the late emir, Sanusi recalled how the previous king used to immunize his children to showcase the importance of immunization to the people.
His words, “If we’re to show you the picture of the late emir, where he was immunizing, any time he wanted to immunize children, he would always use my kids, that is his own grandchildren. Do you believe that if he intended to harm people, he would zero it on his own grandchildren.
“When the issue of immunization started and people started saying that it was intended to stop women from giving birth but for the way I’m seeing women today I’m sure a lot of them are beneficiaries of the immunization, when they started, I can see a lot of them carrying babies.
“For that reason, I want you to be rest assured that this immunization has no harmful effects, but rather to help from harmful diseases. So I count on you to disregard any misconception about this exercise because we’ll not allow anybody to harm you. If we do we’ll stand on the day of resurrection to give account to Almighty Allah.
“Before we had rampant cases of people with measles but today, if you’re asked to identify 10 people with measles in one town, it will be difficult, it’s as a result of God’s intervention and this immunization that we have this drastic reduction in the scourge.”
The United Nations Children’s Fund, (UNICEF), which facilitated the immunization campaign had expressed its determination to assist the state in ending polio scourge noted
Dr. Rahma Rihood Muhammed-Farah, the Chief of UNICEF Field Office Kano at a recent Media Roundtable in Jigawa, emphasized that the campaign coincides with World Immunisation Week.
Muhammed- Farah, who was represented by the Kano Field Office Health Manager by Dr. Serekeberehan Seyoum Deres revealed that in 2025, 18 cases of polio have been reported across 18 local government areas in nine states of Nigeria, with two of these cases occurring in the Hadejia and Sule Tankarkar LGAs of Jigawa State.
The PHCDA Chief who was represented by the Director of Primary Health in the agency, Dr. Hassan Shuaibu Kwalam, while addressing newsmen saying the objective of the immunization was to ramp up all traces polio virus was eliminated in the state.
Kwalam who recalled that in 2013, Nigeria was certified polio-free, but regretted that the country was still experiencing some variants of the polo virus, “and that’s why this campaign is very important because we’re aiming to boost population immunity and reach and you know we’re still struggling with some key indicators, especially around some routine immunization, we wanted to ride on the exercise to scale up the routine exercise.”
He said the state targets two million children under five years of age across the 27 LGAs over four days, using the house-house team as well as a fix plus 2 in arch of the 287 political wards in the state.
Abdullahi said the local government council had budgeted to build five primary healthcare posts this year, one of which is flagged off the Jiba community on Sunday.
“The reason for the construction of the primary healthcare post in Jiba is because of the noncompliance. We had set up a committee to come and investigate the reason for polio noncompliance, and we found that the people protested against the non availability of the health post which I promise to fulfill to them we will construct one.
“They are now complying and today is a reality because nobody is making any complaints and numbers of people are encouraging.”
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