Foundation President of the Nigerian Academy of Medicine (NAMED), Emeritus Prof Samuel Ohaegbulam, has decried declining recognition of excellence in Nigeria, asking the Federal Government to seek ways to revitalise it.
Ohaegbulam lamented the neglect of the Nigerian National Order of Merit (NNOM) award, established as an act of the Federal Government in 1979 as a symbol of national pride to honour the finest brains in medicine, science, engineering and the humanities. He described it as a “national tragedy.”
He said that in the past three years, the Nigerian National Merit Award (NNMA) domiciled at the Merit House, Abuja, had been starved of funding, unable to carry out its yearly competitive process to identify and honour not more than four recipients of NNOM.
Speaking on the theme, “Nigeria’s Path to greatness: Quality and Meritocracy,” at the 2025 Annual Lecture, Induction Ceremony and Scientific Conference of NAMED, Ohaegbulam, a Neurosurgeon, insisted that a country loses its soul when it stops recognising merit.
“It is inconceivable that while vast sums are spent on political pageantry, an institution enshrined by law is denied the modest resources needed to fulfil its mandate. What message are we sending to our youth, our scholars, and our innovators?
“Our Academy should work to unify Nigeria’s intellectual forces—Medicine, Science, Engineering, and the Humanities, because no nation can suppress excellence and still expect progress. The consequences of neglecting merit are already visible: rising corruption, deepening insecurity, and a crumbling education system,” he observed.
He said the Academy of Medicine was deeply concerned about the deteriorating state of the health sector, which, according to him, had been compounded by inadequate budgetary allocations, as well as a lack of essential diagnostic tools like CT and MRI machines in the hospitals and tertiary institutions.
