COMMISSIONER for Health, Delta State, Dr. Mordi Ononye, has warned admission seekers to be wary of patronizing admission racketeers who engage in collecting money from prospecting students by giving them fake promises of admission into the State schools of nursing.
Ononye gave the warning on Thursday in Asaba when reacting to the case of money-for-admission brought to the attention of the Ministry.
According to the Commissioner, “we received a complaint from a prospecting student who applied and sat for the entrance examination in March this year into the School of Nursing Warri and couldn’t make the required score who gave a nurse four hundred thousand naira to get admitted.”
He explained that the nurse who works in a private hospital in Warri collected the said amount with a promise to assist the prospecting student who is a male get admission into the School.
However, when the said nurse could not meet up with her promise, the student reported the matter to the Director of Nursing Department in the Ministry.
On reception of the complaint, an official of the Ministry placed a call across to the nurse after he received her number from the student, lured her to come to the office in company of the said student and with the sum of one hundred thousand naira that the admission will be secured.
“Before she came, we hinted the Police and they planted two plain clothes detectives at the office, we were able to get her to commit herself by recording her on tape, before she was arrested and taken to the Police Command headquarters”.
The Commissioner stated that the said nurse will be prosecuted as the full course of the law would be allowed to take its cause.
He added that the nurse and the prospecting student have given useful statements to the Police which will assist them in their investigation.
It would be recalled that Delta State Government established five nursing schools namely schools of nursing Warri, Agbor and Eku and schools of midwifery Asaba and Sapele to train prospective nurses and midwives.
By Donald Ojebo
