BY SAMIE WAIKORI
The Guadalcanal provincial government is planning to establish a provincial hospital.
In pursuit of the plan, the province has identified five hectares of land for the proposed hospital project.
According to William Atu, Premier of Guadalcanal, this demonstrates the commitment of his government to partner with the national government on the proposal.
“We will be working closely with key government stakeholders to establish a Guadalcanal provincial hospital,” he said.
Atu stated the province has a growing population and needs to establish a provincial hospital in the province, apart from National Referral hospital in Honiara.
He said the plan was shared with the delegation from the Opposition group during their recent visit to Guadalcanal provincial government, and they voiced supported behind it.
“We made an appeal when a delegation from the opposition group visited the provincial government.
“And I thanked the Leader of the Opposition for taking the matter to parliament,” Atu said.
He said populated provinces such as Malaita and Western provinces have their own hospitals and Guadalcanal, as one of the populated provinces must also have one.
“My government is liaising with responsible government to explore potentials for the province to have a provincial hospital.
“Having in place the hospital will help a lot to ease the pressure on the national referral hospital,” Atu said.
In the meantime, Guadalcanal province recognises the challenges faced in delivering primary healthcare in the remote inland areas in the province.
He said the province is grateful that the challenge has been addressed though the Provincial Capacity Development Fund (PCDF) supported projects.
“Thanks to the PCDF programme and World Bank through the IEDRC for supporting a completion of a rural health centre in Tasimboko, benefiting over 10,000 people in the area.
“We also successfully reopened three of the nine closed clinics in the province to which many were closed due to land dispute and vandalism,” Atu said.
He mentioned that to address land dispute, his government is working to secure land titles of where the health facilities are located in the province.
Premier Atu also appeals to people in Guadalcanal province to respect clinics, schools and other public infrastructure which are established to help develop the province.
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