By Adewale Sanyaolu
National Association of Seadogs (Pyrates Confraternity) has warned against the hijack of the inoculation of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine to avoid a disastrous outing.
The NAS Capoon, Abiola Owoaje, in a statement on behalf of the group, entitled: ‘COVID-19 vaccination: averting a disastrous exercise’, urged the National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) to stick to its phased plan for the inoculation exercise.
“We implore the NPHCDA to resist any pressure to jettison this laudable plan by ensuring fairness and transparency in the inoculation exercise.
“The safety and health of Nigerians should be the overriding interest to guide the exercise. The ugly incident of hoarding of COVID-19 palliatives which were denied the vulnerable segment of the society and the hijack of medical kits donated by the billionaire, Jack Ma, by some political interests must not repeat itself,” he said.
Owoaje, while calling on NPHCDA to ensure its website works efficiently to ease the smooth registration of Nigerians, advocated multi-sectoral collaboration between the Federal Government agencies and the 36 states’ governments for a coordinated action to achieve a hitch free exercise.
According to him, the recent busting of a fake COVID-19 vaccine distribution centre in China and South Africa by International Police Organisation, couple with the alarm that there may be more centres across the globe, is a wake-up call for the Federal Government to put necessary structures in place and place relevant security and regulatory agencies on alert to prevent fake vaccines from being imported into the country.
