Catholic Church steps into government shoes, builds modern health centre in Lebialem

By Tata Mbunwe

The Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Mamfe, Mgr Aloysius Abangalo, this February 6, inaugurated a modern health centre at M’muock Leteh village in Wabane Subdivision of Lebialem, a crisis-embattled part of the Southwest Region of Cameroon.

The health facility built by the Catholic Church aims to boost access to healthcare in the area, where thousands of people are reported to be in dire need of quality health services.

The Bishop was warmly welcomed by the Fon of M’muock Leteh, HRH Fotang VI, who accompanied the prelate in the inauguration.

The health centre is expected to serve thousands of people from M’muock Leteh and surrounding villages including Bamumbu, Besali, M’muock Fossimondi and others in Lebialem Division.

Like many other areas in the Northwest and Southwest Regions, Lebialem Division desperately needs quality healthcare services, as most Government-owned health centres have either closed down due to insecurity, or are inadequately supplied.

The situation is more disturbing in villages like Essoh Attah in Fontem Subdivision of Lebialem, where natives told MMI last month, that the healthcare system has collapsed.

A native who lives in the community said patients were being transported on stretchers for several kilometres through the forest to neighbouring hospitals in the West Region.

The village health centres long collapsed and the a private clinic, set up by a Roman Catholic priest to help the community, is highly inadequate and lacks virtually every basic supply.

Humanitarian groups, such as Doctors Without Borders, that used to take healthcare services to vulnerable communities amid in the Anglophone Crisis abandoned the job — because the government continued accusing them of aiding armed separatists fighters.

Two of the organisation’s workers who were had been detained for 10 months at the Buea Central Prison in the Southwest Region were only released this January after a military court acquitted them of all charges.

Mimi Mefo Info