7th November, 2024
By Jethro Ibileke
Nigeria’s former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, on Wednesday recounted the pain of loosing his late wife, Mrs Stella Obasanjo, few months to her 60th birthday anniversary.
Mrs Obasanjo died on the 23rd day of October,2005 at a private health clinic in Puerto Banús, Marbella, Spain.
The former President recalled his pain while speaking at the commissioning of the 250-bed Stella Obasanjo Hospital rebuilt and expanded by the Edo State Government. He described his late wife as a pillar of support who contributed tremendously to the achievements of his government.
He commended the people of Edo State and the administration of former Governor Lucky Igbinedion, for immortalising his wife by naming the Hospital after her in 2007.
He further described her as a wife indeed who deserved any honor that could be given to her when she was alive and at death.
The former President recounted how his late wife did everything humanly possible to get him out of prison.
He said: “When I was in prison, that woman left no stone unturned, she went all over the world to seek for my release.
“She went to Japan, she went to the entire Europe, she went to the Vatican, she went to Latin America, she went throughout Africa, she left no stone unturned for my release and God answered her prayers and the prayers of all those praying for me and I came out of prison alive.
“I thought, coming out of prison, I’ve had it all. We were planning for my wife’s 60th birthday anniversary, we never had that birthday anniversary before she died.
“It was very painful to me in particular and to all of us in my family. You can appreciate how thankful I am to you for doing this in her honor.
“I thank all the people of Edo state because I had a woman who made tremendous contributions to my achievements of my government,” he added.
Speaking further, Obasanjo tasked political office holders to dwell more on human capital development to their citicenry, noting that no government can be described as successful without human capital development.
He described food and nutrition security as one the major capital development, noting that without food, citizens would not be healthy to enjoy infrastructural development.
He said: “Whatever we do in our responsibility as chief executives, either at the national level, at the state level or even at the local government level, one thing that is very, very important is human capital development.
“I will take three essentials of human capital development. First is food and nutrition security. You can’t do much on empty stomach.
“The second, of course, is health, and food and nutrition security has something to do with that. Health is wealth, they say. A healthy people is a healthy nation, because, if you are dead, you can no longer be counted among those who are healthy.
“And, I dare to say that health is everything. You must have health to be able to be alive and do other things. And the third, of course, is education.”
Obasanjo who commended Governor Godwin Obaseki for rebuilding the hospital. He noted that the facility which started as a mother and child hospital had now been expanded and upgraded to a apecialist hospital with a cutting-edge technology.
In her remarks before the commissioning of the Hospital, a former First Lady, Mrs. Patience Goodluck Jonathan, thanked the Governor Obaseki-led administration for keeping the memory of the late Stella Obasanjo alive by reconstructing and upgrading the hospital that would not only serve the people of Edo State but the entire country.
On his part, Governor Obaseki, said the upgrade of the hospital to a world-class one was prompted by the Covid-19 pandemic when it was used as an isolation centre for patients.
He disclosed that the hospital was equipped with the state-of-art modern medical facilities that could treat any ailments that could be treated overseas.
