Nigeria needs to take a leaf out of Winston Churchill’s book and create a Covid-19 equipment production directorate

By Ayo Akinfe

(1) World War Two is one of my greatest passions ever. I forever marvel at the way it transformed industrial production, unleashed an unprecedented wave of human ingenuity, led to the integration of women into the global workforce and mechanised virtually everything we do

(2) From time immemorial, conflicts and trying times have always unleashed this kind of spirit. For instance, superstition more or less ended in Europe when the continent got hit with the Bubonic Plague in 1665. From that point on, Europeans accepted that medicine and not religious faith is the solution to ailments. Health and pharmacy were no longer considered heresy and doctors became more respected than priests

(3) Here we are in the middle of a global pandemic just as universal as World War Two and make no mistake about it, mankind will come out of this crisis stronger. It will lead to new production methods, fresh advances in medicine and alterations to the way we trade, live and produce goods, just as World War Two did. As the saying goes: “The darker the night, the brighter the dawn.”

(4) For me, Winston Churchill really came into his element in the run-up to D-Day when the maverick in him came out. He created a special directorate to manufacture all sorts of equipment to facilitate the landing on the Normandy beaches. These included floating battle tanks, mechanised minesweepers, barbed wire cutting vehicles, etc. Known as Hobart's Funnies because the directorate was headed by a gentlemen known as Percy Hobart, the directorate ensured D-Day was roaring success

(5) Many members of the defence establishment did not approve of Churchill’s crazy initiative, so rather than report to military headquarters, the unit reported directly to the prime minister’s office at 10 Downing Street. As we all know, this directorate ensured D-Day caught the Germans unawares. Do you know that Britain even laid an oil pipeline connecting the Isle of Wight with France under 24 hours?

(6) We are faced with an unprecedented crisis in Nigeria and now is the time for us to stand up and be counted in the community of nations. It simply cannot be business as usual with us going out to buy all our needs. Apart from the fact that nobody can supply 200m with medical equipment to combat coronavirus at the moment, I believe we owe it to humanity to make a significant contribution to this global effort to combat this pandemic. Most nations have banned the sale of medical equipment, so whether we like it or not, our import dependency simply has to end today

(7) South Korea for instance is aiming to increase its daily face mask output from 10m to at least 13m as a result of this pandemic. Masks will be distributed mainly to pharmacies, post offices, and government locations for citizens to purchase. Each citizen can purchase up to two masks a week and the Korean government will monitor sales through a computerised system, to prevent people from buying more than their share

(8) In Japan, electronics maker Sharp has begun making surgical masks, becoming the first domestic company outside the health industry to do so in response to a government call of increased production. Sharp now has a daily capacity of 150,000 masks, with the company receiving a 30 million yen subsidy from the Japanese government for its efforts

(9) Foxconn Technology Group, Sharp's Taiwanese parent, has created its own mask production line at a manufacturing campus in Shenzhen that will supply its army of workers. The world's biggest iPhone assembler, which trades as Hon Hai Precision Industry, is now producing 2m masks per day

(10) My heart bleeds at the fact that Nigeria has not established a Covid directorate with production targets for facemasks, ventilators, testing kits, etc just like everyone else. We should not only meet domestic demand through internal production but also be a major supplier to the world. For too long, the world has carried Nigeria on its back and it is time for this nonsense to end. Enough is enough. It is time for us to start pulling our weight and cease to be a parasitic leach on the rest of humanity