National Elderly Citizens Centre Director General Emem Omokaro (NSCC). As part of the government’s commitment to older persons, the facility assists and supports them. She discussed the centre’s success with Trust TV’s Daily Politics. Excerpt:
Who’s old? 60 is the statutory retirement age for most public officials, and the national policy on ageing says 60, which we have operationalized in our national plan of action.
To use the National Senior Citizens Centre, you must be 70.
The National Older Citizens Centre identifies senior citizen needs and prioritizes them.
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First and foremost is identifying older adults’ training and capability requirements.
After retiring?
Yes!
Do they need training?
It recognizes that older people have the expertise, experiences, talents, passions, and rights to continue interacting and participating in the things they love and value.
It then discusses creating businesses and livelihoods for elderly individuals to augment their income.
It discusses health, social care, social assistance, safety net, and other help programmes for vulnerable older adults.
Of course, it discusses sports, recreation, counselling, and data systems for older people.
It encourages states and local governments to domesticate the act and adopt ageing policies so we can match our services with theirs.
And to make sure we connect with regional and global organizations to aid us.
Is it recurring?
We published our 10-year strategic road map, which all our partners are taking up, and our global partners are saying, “Yes, Nigeria is really serious about this, this is where they are, this is where they want to go.” They’ve discovered all the issues and are constructing them.
We have a national plan of action on ageing and have broken it down into project activities that we will incorporate into the national development plan 2025.
What is your relationship with other government agencies?
We visited all MDAs with overlapping legislative mandates, and we visited all these MDAs to determine their mandates and how they overlap with ours. That is why one of our strategies was ageing mainstreaming, meaning find where these programmes already exist and where older persons were previously excluded and then make a high point of persuasion and not just make a high point of persuasion but enhance their capacity to understand ageing and fund the point of their statutory mandate to understand the kinds of age-specific programmes they can develop and then we can work with them.
Do these ministries and agencies agree?
Yes, we have signed MoUs with ministries on projects that mainstream older people, either ours or theirs. Because of geriatric care, we signed an Agreement with the Federal Ministry of Health. Our focus is on older people, but the ministry’s mandate is ours.
I read about a ninety-something former US president. Is Carter?
That he’s leaving the hospital and returning home.
We want domiciliary care, which is homecare provided by professional carers through care agencies.
We can also have qualified and accredited agencies operate some residential homes, which they now do but need to be standardized.
I tried to register one of my aunties, my mother’s sister, but the HMO issued me a cost of approximately 200,000 compared to less than 50,000 for a newborn infant. What’s wrong?
I’m still determining.
She just registered in healthcare.
Health insurance?
Yes!
I think the National Health Insurance Authority Act now covers older people and the disadvantaged for free without profits. The legislation and NHIS say so.
When will it surface?
The legislation was only passed this year, so we are working on that because you need a pool of money to achieve that. Then, NHIA has built a community-based healthcare system, and we are working with several states to see how older people might benefit.
Training carers, certifying agencies, and items brings sanity to a sector so we can collaborate with National Health Insurance Scheme and other insurance companies to create a sanitized long-term care system.
I warned you there was nothing. Therefore, we now construct these policy guidelines, benchmark statements, minimum standards, and certifications to safeguard our elderly folks. One example.
You also inquired how these MDAs operate together. We cooperate with the National Directorate of Employment to integrate our older people into their mature persons programme and provide grants and loans for their entrepreneurial and livelihood endeavours.
We are collaborating with SMEDAN to highlight elderly entrepreneurs who continue to engage and contribute.
It’s simply that before today, they were invisible, and it was conventional that if you gave an older adult a loan, he’d fall down and die.
So we are trying to re-program people’s minds so that you can find a typical older person—frail, elderly, and sick—but you can also find a 70-year-old man or woman who is more energetic than a 30-year-old and has their skills and experiences, which you can use.
Entrepreneurship has produced many things. Senior help indigenous crafts were recently assessed nationally.
Okay, is it a culture or religion in this part of the world that we don’t have elderly homes?
Okay, I told you we’re standardizing care, and there are many care settings. I suggested domicile houses, especially for medium, long-term care, and community care, where we establish our senior centres. Active senior centres are like daycares for older people in that town.
In fact, we are launching a one community, one senior facility initiative to get private sector cooperation so you may develop in your town. We’re writing those operations manuals and policy guidelines, and a senior centre must meet this criterion. Now we want to monitor, evaluate, and build programmes that you can adapt to your culture. You mentioned health and transport, and I know senior folks in some countries have a specific card for travel, and you don’t pay—present the card.
I informed you that NSCC is looking at multi-sectoral issues, ageing as a development issue, and strengthening capacity and partnerships in all MDAs.
When it comes to age-friendly transport, especially housing and environment, we are working with NIMC to develop this card that you are talking about because we had that presidential directive, that declaration, that we should progressively register older persons so that cards can be issued to them to access discounts, concessions and priority treatment in public spaces, trains and all that.
We’ve constructed the dummy and are eager to find a funding source.
How about the elderly? Are monetary incentives planned for them?
That’s part of what we’re talking about, and some elderly people receive conditional household grants.
We’ve moved and pushed, so I’m good. We want an independent social safety net for older people, as you know.
