Afe Babalola urges Nigerians to invest in education, healthcare

Legal luminary and founder of Afe Babalola University in
Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), Aare Afe Babalola (SAN), has urged well-meaning
Nigerians to join him in promoting quality and functional
education, industry, service and character as well as discipline in
humanity.

He said this would leave the society better than they met
it.

Babalola spoke yesterday at the brief ceremony that heralded the
beginning of operation at the 400-bed ABUAD Multi-System Hospital
in Ado-Ekiti, the Ekiti State capital.

The eminent lawyer noted that if more well-to-do Nigerians
channel their resources towards the establishment of quality
universities and health facilities, there would be no reason for
people to send their children to foreign lands for education or
medical service.

According to him, with the modern equipment in his nine-year-old
university and the state-of-the-art equipment at his Multi-System
Hospital, which was inaugurated on October 21, last year, the
university has been rated Number One Private University in Nigeria
by Webometrics, while the hospital has been primed to provide
quality health care that would end medical tourism outside
Nigeria.

Babalola opened the doors of the hospital, which is managed by
ABUAD and Aster DM Healthcare of Dubai, for a four-day procedures
at discounted rates and free consultation from yesterday till March
24.

He said: “I must make it clear that this hospital is open to
everyone – the rich and the not-so-rich alike. We will run this
place like we run our chambers where we handle the cases of the
not-so-rich at minimal charges while those who can pay are made to
pay.

“In the short and long run, the rich and the not-so-rich will be
happy. The rich will pay less than they would have paid going
abroad for the same treatment, while we will be able to subsidise
the cost for people on the lower rung of the ladder.”

Those at the ceremony included Babalola’s wife, Yeye Aare
Modupe; ABUAD’s Vice Chancellor Prof. Michael Ajisafe; his two
deputies – Prof. Yekini Lawal (DVC Academic) and Prof. Smaranda
Olarinde (DVC Administration); some members of the Board of
Trustees (BoT) of the university; Dr. Gboyega Babalola, a member of
the Governing Council of the university and the Catholic Bishop of
Ekiti Diocese, Bishop Felix Ajalaiye.

Legal luminary and founder of Afe Babalola University in
Ado-Ekiti (ABUAD), Aare Afe Babalola (SAN), has urged well-meaning
Nigerians to join him in promoting quality and functional
education, industry, service and character as well as discipline in
humanity.

He said this would leave the society better than they met
it.

Babalola spoke yesterday at the brief ceremony that heralded the
beginning of operation at the 400-bed ABUAD Multi-System Hospital
in Ado-Ekiti, the Ekiti State capital.

The eminent lawyer noted that if more well-to-do Nigerians
channel their resources towards the establishment of quality
universities and health facilities, there would be no reason for
people to send their children to foreign lands for education or
medical service.

According to him, with the modern equipment in his nine-year-old
university and the state-of-the-art equipment at his Multi-System
Hospital, which was inaugurated on October 21, last year, the
university has been rated Number One Private University in Nigeria
by Webometrics, while the hospital has been primed to provide
quality health care that would end medical tourism outside
Nigeria.

Babalola opened the doors of the hospital, which is managed by
ABUAD and Aster DM Healthcare of Dubai, for a four-day procedures
at discounted rates and free consultation from yesterday till March
24.

He said: “I must make it clear that this hospital is open to
everyone – the rich and the not-so-rich alike. We will run this
place like we run our chambers where we handle the cases of the
not-so-rich at minimal charges while those who can pay are made to
pay.

“In the short and long run, the rich and the not-so-rich will be
happy. The rich will pay less than they would have paid going
abroad for the same treatment, while we will be able to subsidise
the cost for people on the lower rung of the ladder.”

Those at the ceremony included Babalola’s wife, Yeye Aare
Modupe; ABUAD’s Vice Chancellor Prof. Michael Ajisafe; his two
deputies – Prof. Yekini Lawal (DVC Academic) and Prof. Smaranda
Olarinde (DVC Administration); some members of the Board of
Trustees (BoT) of the university; Dr. Gboyega Babalola, a member of
the Governing Council of the university and the Catholic Bishop of
Ekiti Diocese, Bishop Felix Ajalaiye.