Articles by Sahara Reporters

Health

Over 4000 Doctors, Dentists Left Nigeria In 2024 Alone Amid Health Sector Crisis

Nigeria’s health sector is facing one of its worst workforce crises in decades as a staggering 4,193 doctors and dentists left the country in 2024 alone, according to a new report released by the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare. The Nigeria Health Statistics Report on Friday, paints a troubling picture of a system losing skilled professionals at an alarming rate. Between 2023 and 2024, the migration of health workers across all cadres surged by a shocking 200 per cent. The document reveals that a total of 43,221 doctors, nurses, pharmacists and medical laboratory scientists relocated abroad within the two-year period, further deepening the already critical brain drain in Nigeria’s fragile healthcare system. Despite modest growth in the number of trained professionals between 2022 and 2024, the report notes that only about half of registered health workers are currently licensed to practise — a regulatory gap that limits capacity even before accounting for migration losses. “Attrition, especially through external migration, remains a significant challenge. External migration surged by 200 per cent across all cadres between 2023 and 2024. In 2024 alone, a total of 4,193 doctors and dentists left Nigeria, with approximately 66 per cent migrating to the United Kingdom. Nurses and midwives are the most affected groups.” Between 2023 and 2024, the United Kingdom took the lead among preferred destinations for Nigerian doctors and dentists, receiving 4,627 practitioners. Other top destinations included Canada (934), the United States (561), Australia (188), the UAE (140), Ireland (113), the Maldives (77), Botswana (67), India (57) and Saudi Arabia (43). Nurses and midwives are leaving even faster. As of 2024, more than 23,000 had migrated, driven by better pay, improved working conditions and opportunities for career growth abroad. Pharmacists and medical laboratory scientists are also exiting in large numbers. Canada, the UK and Australia led as destinations for pharmacists, while medical laboratory scientists migrated mostly to Canada (6,393), the UAE (2,010), Ireland (1,500), the U.S. (1,052) and the UK (410). This exodus has left many hospitals and clinics severely understaffed, stretching the remaining workforce thin and undermining patient care, especially in underserved rural communities. Although the Federal Government says it has recruited more than 37,000 healthcare workers since 2023 — over 75 per cent of them in clinical roles — Nigeria’s yawning workforce gap continues to widen. Speaking at the Joint Annual Report meeting of the health sector in Abuja, the Minister of State for Health and Social Welfare, Dr. Iziaq Salako, acknowledged the grim reality. “Our doctor-to-population ratio is 1:5,000 (against the WHO recommendation of 1:600), while the nurse-to-population ratio is as low as 1:2,000 (against the WHO recommendation of 1:300). This is further compounded by inequities in the distribution of health workers, where 75 per cent are concentrated in urban areas, serving 45 per cent of the population,” Salako said. He noted that the problem is worsened by urban–rural inequality, with 75 per cent of health workers concentrated in cities serving less than half of Nigeria’s population. Despite the challenges, Salako insisted that the Federal Government remains committed to reversing the trend. He said the administration is expanding training quotas, strengthening primary healthcare, updating the Health Workforce Registry and implementing a migration policy aimed at improving retention. “Though migration continues to adversely affect retention, a health workforce migration policy has been developed to achieve better retention and foster more collaborative contributions from Nigerian health professionals in the diaspora” he added.

Technology

BREAKING: Nigerian Immigration Seizes Senator Natasha's Passport At Airport As Lawmaker Accuses Senate President Akpabio

The Senator representing Kogi Central, Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, has alleged that Senate President Godswill Akpabio ordered Nigerian immigration officers to seize her international passport at the airport, preventing her from travelling abroad. In a video obtained by SaharaReporters on Tuesday, the lawmaker was seen questioning immigration officials at the airport over the alleged confiscation of her passport. She described the action as an unlawful restriction of her movement and a gross violation of her fundamental rights. “Hello, fellow Nigerians. I’m Senator Natasha. Having completed my second year in office, I decided to take a week off. I’m at the airport here, and my passport has been withheld again,” she said in the video. “This same thing happened before when I was stopped from travelling even though I had committed no offence, and there was no court order restricting me. The officer in charge told me that the Senate President, Senator Godswill Akpabio, instructed them to withhold my passport and prevent me from travelling because he claimed that each time I go abroad, I ‘spoil the image of the country’ by granting interviews to international media,” she added. Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan expressed frustration over what she described as repeated harassment and intimidation, urging authorities to intervene and end the “embarrassment.” As of the time of filing this report, neither the Nigerian Immigration Service nor the office of the Senate President had issued an official response to the allegations. On May 19, 2025, SaharaReporters reported that Senator Natasha has petitioned the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, accusing Senate President Godswill Akpabio of masterminding a coordinated smear campaign aimed at discrediting her and silencing her sexual harassment allegations. In the petition submitted through her legal team led by Dr. Ehiogie West-Idahosa, SAN, Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan alleged that her safety, reputation, and political career are under attack in what she describes as a "malicious campaign of criminal defamation, cyber-stalking, conspiracy, and attempted assassination" engineered by the Senate President. The petition, supported by what her lawyers described as “incontrovertible evidence from public broadcasts, witness testimonies, media reports, and expert analyses,” claims the retaliatory campaign began shortly after the senator publicly accused Akpabio of sexual harassment on national television on February 28, 2025. “In the weeks following our client’s suspension from the Senate, a previously unknown individual styling herself as ‘Professor Mgbeke’ began publishing sympathetic commentaries on Facebook. However, what followed shocked our client,” the petition reads. “Immediately after our client declined any form of transactional engagement, ‘Prof. Mgbeke’ began what evolved into a deliberate, malicious and coordinated campaign of character assassination.” According to the petition, the woman behind the online persona “Prof. Mgbeke” was later identified as Dr. Sandra Chidinma Duru, a Nigerian resident in Texas. Senator Natasha claimed she only discovered Duru's true identity after a live broadcast on May 1, 2025, and subsequent journalistic investigations. “She had never heard the name Sandra Duru until law enforcement officers requested she identify her. The deception, the manipulation of public sentiment, and the ultimate betrayal formed the foundation of a well-orchestrated campaign designed to destroy our client’s public image,” the petition notes. The petition directly links Senator Akpabio to Dr. Duru’s alleged smear campaign, citing a revealing May 1 broadcast in which Duru inadvertently exposed her phone’s call log. The log allegedly contained saved contacts such as “My Daddy Directline,” “IGP Kayode,” “Senator Akpabio” (with two different numbers), and “Oby Ndukwe,” among others.