From Okwe Obi, Abuja
Omokaro Emem is the first Director General of the National Senior Citizen Centre (NSCC).
In this interview, she linked the high rate of abuse of older persons to ignorance of people who accuse them of witchcraft. Emem, however, said that the only way to change the disturbing narrative is for the government to carry out intensive sensitisation and education.
She noted that most elderly persons are not liabilities as erroneously believed, adding that the majority of them significantly contribute to the economy of the country especially at the grassroots level.
She bared her mind on her plans for the centre, which among other things, include the gathering of accurate demographic and geographic data of older persons to enable the government provide them with social amenities and to decisively deal with serial abusers of the aged.
What is the National Senior Citizen Centre all about?
You know that the Senior Citizens Centre was established by the National Senior Citizen Centre Act. It is an act of the National Assembly and that gives it the legal backing, durability and sustainability. The mandate of the centre is to initiate, facilitate and empower the inclusion of older persons in healthcare, economic and social opportunities, just to ensure that they are provided the dignity, the enhanced capacity to participate in what they value. As a matter of fact, the Act guarantees that. Of course, you know that before now, the issues of older persons were not really seen as development issues. They were seen as welfare issues. It was discretional. Now, with the Act and the National Policy on Aging, this is setting up the institution, the policy, the mechanism to really integrate older persons into development. The inauguration of the Board was on June 7th. So, following from there, there are paper works to do. So far, we have been trying to settle down with regards to finding physical space where we can call our office. We have also tried to develop our organogram in a way that will give us clarity of what we intend to achieve. So, from start, we really want to ensure that we have a clear vision, which will define the vision, mission and what our commitment will be and the strategy to achieving that commitment. However, we still need to develop a five-year strategic plan for that. We are still en route to have our staff posted to us. Initially, we had to start with civil servants already in the system before we can have the waiver to employ ours. We are trying to ensure that our take off grant are pulled and we also want to plug into a midterm national development plan, which is ongoing. So, it has really been busy time after the inauguration.
At what age can we say a person is a senior citizen?
The National Policy on Aging, which was recently approved, defined a senior citizen as someone that is 60 years and above. However, the Senior Citizens Centre Act, for the purpose of participating in the Senior Citizens Centre that will be set up, says the age is from 70 years up. So, we will also look into that to see how we can reconcile the difference in ages in our strategic plan. Of course, you know that 60 years is mandatory for retirement for most civil servants, although 70 years is for the judiciary and the academics if you are up to professorial level.
How many senior citizens do we have and how do you intend to reach them in rural areas?
Following from the Nigerian Living Standard Survey carried out by the National Bureau of Statistic (NBS) in 2019, we have about 14.9 million older persons. We are working with the ICT to extract the data in the statistics. About 70 per cent of those in the statistics are in rural areas. We are setting our strategy essentially to ensure provision of programmes and services and accessibility. We have done our desk review. What the Act mandates us to do is the provision of healthcare, social programmes, entrepreneurship, work schemes, educational and living opportunities, among others. You will discover that these are core mandates of some ministries, departments and agencies. For instance, for health, the ministry of health is in charge of provision of primary health care to the rural areas. For social programmes, when you talk about social safety net and NASSCO is under our mother ministry, which is the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development. When you talk about work scheme, which include farming, you are talking about the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. We have already mapped out how we are going to do that. We will use the system, procedures and mechanisms already in place. For instance, I have informally visited the National Human Rights Commission. So, when we talk about elder abuse, we are talking about providing supportive system for older persons and facilitating their access to justice, ensuring that people are aware of elder abuse, educative programmes on elder abuse, preventive measures for elder abuse. We know that the NHRC has offices in all the states of the federation. We know that they have desk on vulnerable groups, reporting portal and call centres where people call in to report abuse. So, we are going to structure a very definitive agreement with the NHRC.
How do you intend to give a facelift to those centres so as to change the fortunes of the aged?
As a matter of fact, about five per cent of persons who are 75 years and above have one form of disability or the other. It could be sensory, locomotive and mobility. Yes, we have a department or a unit in our organogram for special needs group and persons with disabilities fall under the unit. We have also created a unit under health promotion programme that we call central care supply services. We also included it in our midterm developmental plan to ensure that we acquire supportive devices for older persons because it is very heartbreaking to see older persons trying to crawl. I have seen them because we conducted a documentary on ageing and we saw how difficult it is. Most of them are hard of hearing. A simple hearing aid can solve that problem. We intend to deal with older persons by trying to see how we can assist to bring respite and how things can be made accessible to them. The senior citizen centre is set up to succeed and it will succeed because it is about our future.
How far have you gone with the proposed census for older persons?
I called it multi-indicator survey on aging. It is to help us know where our older persons are, their social economic status; are they still engaged? What kind of engagement? Are they educated? What is their level of education? It is when you know them in their diversity that you can actually plan. But we are engaging critical ministries and agencies. Of course, you know that we cannot go out to conduct that. We have to depend on NBS to help. We are talking to NBS to help us and we are also talking with the office of the sustainable development goals.
Are you looking at instituting a policy to sanction those who maltreat older persons?
We already have a national policy to guide the National Senior Citizen Centre. Of course, there is a bill before the National Assembly. It is a private member’s bill. Although, it was initiated by the Coalition of Society for the Rights of Older Persons, which I was on the board drafting the bill before I was appointed. That bill is to ensure the rights and privileges of older persons and it strictly provide for remedy and redress, and punishments for such acts of abuse and neglect.
Enforcement is very important. How do you intend to ensure that the laws are enforced?
The blessedness of the National Citizen Centre is an act of legislation. It is not just a flimsy policy that you say it expires after five years. It is a law set up by an Act, so it is here to stay. Also, this is a pioneering work. It has never existed before, that is why we are doing everything to ensure that it works. Why things do not last is when they are not institutionalised. If you build centres for our senior citizens, what is the line of supply of services and programmes? Where is it coming from? The best thing to do is to critically create that mechanism that links the National Citizen Centre with federal Ministry of Health, primary healthcare, the CSOs and all the mechanism on the ground, and form a unified system so as to engage everybody towards that. So, our place is to coordinate that. Thank God we have a budget. We are not just going begging for people to do for us. So, that answers your question on sustainability.
What are your challenges as the first director general of the centre?
I am only one month old. I am sure there are many challenges in front. Anyway, the challenge now is how to settle down and get all the approvals of what we need to get from the board.
How do you intend to handle inter-agency rivalry?
I have worked with non-governmental organisations and with government in building capacity, advocacy and research to know what you are talking about. But when you have clearly defined your mandate and what you are looking for is when their mandates meet yours and you now tease it out in the technical group and enter an agreement every partner will discover that the partnership is promoting each other’s mandate. For instance, if I secure an agreement with the National Human Rights Commission and then we can strengthen the rights of older persons through our agreement. It has not taken anything from us. They will lay claims to their success. We will lay claims to our success in that regard. So, there is no room for rivalry. In fact, it strengthens each other. I have always believed in partnerships. When my strength is weak, I find a stronger partner.