CENTRAL HOSPITAL READY FOR USE IN LESS THAN 8 MONTHS

The  contractor handling the central hospital in Benin city has assures the Accident and Emergency Wing of the flagship Central Hospital, Benin City, will be ready for use within the next eight months, while work on the 200-bed wing of the hospital will be completed in sixteen months.

Site Engineer of the A&K Construction Limited, the Contractor handling the project, Mr Michel Doghen, told Governor Adams Oshiomhole, today 17th July 2014, during an inspection of the ongoing work at the project. He said the hospital is being reinforced with heavy steel bars while three elevators have been added to the Accident and Emergency Wing, which will also serve as the Administrative Block. Doghen said: “The first wing, Accident and Emergency Complex of the Central Hospital Project is 60% completed.

 In the next eight months, this wing will be completed and work is also going on in the other wing of the Hospital Complex. We have used thick corrugated steel bars of about 25mm to reinforce all parts of the building and by the Grace of God, in another 8 months, the other wing will also be completed.” He said the ongoing work and reinforcements were in tandem with the recommendations of a team of Engineers which assessed the integrity of the structure after an unfortunate incident about two years ago.

Governor Oshiomhole who expressed satisfaction with the progress of the job said “for me, the good news is that we have found solution, the structural defects have been rectified following a re enforcement with the use of 25mm corrugated iron steel bars in the building. “As you can see, job is progressing at a pace that I am very happy with and the quality of materials we have seen look good and when you are passing through the road, you won’t realise the extent of work going on inside the building.” Oshiomhole said, he is also impressed with what I saw in the other wing of the Hospital Complex which is the 200-bed wing.

They have gotten rid of the failed portion and they have re constructed new columns.” Comrade Oshiomhole added that “Looking at the sheer quality, the scalefolding and others, the job is now in a very good hand. I am also impressed that one or two facilities that were not in the original plan have been re- incorporated. So, at the end of the day, there are some positive changes arising from the unfortunate incident that happened sometime ago.

 Fielding questions from journalists at the Project Site, the Honourable Commissioner for Housing and Development, Arch. Francis Evbuomwan said “the State Government took the opportunity of the unfortunate incident that happened to do a redesign of the complex, Architectural Engineering and all others were redesigned. As a part of quality measure, we had to redesign other places that were not initially affected by the incident just to stay ahead of the recommended UN standard for hospitals”.