In a disturbing revelation that underscores the human cost of bureaucratic reshuffling, more than 1,500 health professionals under the Environmental Health Council of Nigeria (EHCON) have gone unpaid for nearly two years following a federal directive that excluded the agency from the national budget.
The council, once instrumental in Nigeria's defense during the Ebola and COVID-19 outbreaks, found itself defunded after being reclassified under the Ministry of Environment. While thirteen other health-related agencies were later granted exemptions and received allocations, EHCON was inexplicably left out — leaving thousands of workers stranded, disillusioned, and unpaid for 20 consecutive months.
According to insiders, the council’s dedicated professionals have continued working in the shadows, operating on personal sacrifice while facing growing hardships. Their roles, which include disease surveillance, sanitation enforcement, and epidemic prevention, are critical to Nigeria’s public health infrastructure — especially as new infectious threats continue to emerge globally.
Secretary to the Government of the Federation, George Akume, has formally appealed to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to intervene. In his plea, Akume emphasized that the continued neglect of EHCON not only demoralizes vital frontline workers but also endangers national health security.
“EHCON is not a peripheral agency; it is a sentinel of our nation’s health,” one official lamented. “To abandon its workforce is to weaken our last line of defense.”
With inflation soaring and economic strain mounting nationwide, the silence surrounding EHCON’s plight sends a chilling message to Nigeria’s public health workforce — one that may deter future professionals from entering the field.
Stakeholders are now urging swift presidential action to correct what many see as an avoidable administrative injustice before it deepens into a full-blown public health crisis.
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