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Cross River Governor, Senator (Prince) Bassey Edet Otu, has appealed to protesting members of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) to return to their professional calling of saving lives as his administration will leave no stone unturned in a bid to secure the return of their abducted colleague.
According to a press release by Mr. Emmanuel Ogbeche, Chief Press Secretary (CPS) to the governor, Otu made the plea while addressing members of the association who were on a peaceful protest for the immediate and unconditional release of their member, Prof Ekanem Philip Ephraim who was kidnapped in Calabar.
“I want to plead that while we still continue to work for the release of your colleague, please let doctors do the best that they can to save lives, because your main call is to save lives.
“I want you to believe us, that just like you, we are also very pained and we are pained that two wrongs will never make a right.
“A lot of things are happening in our hospitals and my administration is poised to ensure the enabling environment is created for you to carry out your statutory duties at all times.
“Nobody is happy that she was taken even for a day apart from the criminal elements. But we will continue to do everything possible to ensure her safe return to the confines of her family and the association,” the governor assured.
The governor also gave the assurance that his administration was working closely with the various security agencies to drastically curb, if not totally, eradicate kidnapping in the state.
The governor further applauded the contributions and sacrifices of doctors in the state, remarking that his administration will not be defeated by the challenges of those involved in nefarious activities.
“Though it is a bad situation but at the darkest end of the tunnel, there is always a light. It is true that we have promised the season of sweetness, we will continue to live by the ethos and I know that Rome was not built in a day, the journey of a thousand miles begin one day, not too long we will clear our society of all miscreants,” Otu stated.
Earlier, the welfare officer of the state chapter of the National Association of Resident Doctors, Dr. Mino Magam, disclosed that Prof. Ekanem has been with her abductors for over 25 days, which has left them deeply worried.
“We are not even sure if our colleague is safe, if she is well and if she is alive.
“We have come because of the pains we are suffering, we know that other Cross River people are also suffering the pain.
“We have come because our absence from our duty posts at this very moment is a reflection of the sad situation in the state in the sense that we cannot even give account of the morbidity and mortality that are silent and still going on in the state right now,” Magam said.
Michael Jegede contributed this report from Abuja.
