Reported by: Oahimire Omone Precious | Edited by: Oravbiere Osayomore Promise.
Two kidney patients collapsed in the corridor. A cancer patient missed her last round of chemotherapy. The Intensive Care Unit has been running on a skeleton crew for six days. And the Chief Medical Director of Nigeria’s foremost teaching hospital in the South‑South is now publicly begging his own doctors to please, just come back to work.
In an emotional appeal posted on his Facebook page in the early hours of Sunday, the Chief Medical Director (CMD) of the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital (UUTH), Professor Emem Bassey, broke his silence on the crisis that has paralysed one of Akwa Ibom State’s largest referral centres. “Patients requiring dialysis are uncertain where help will come from,” he wrote. “Critically ill patients needing intensive care are left vulnerable. Cancer patients awaiting treatment are anxious and helpless. Pregnant women, newborn babies, children, the elderly and accident victims continue to suffer. Some lives have sadly already been lost.”
His plea came nearly a week after the hospital was thrown into chaos. On Tuesday, 12 May 2026, operatives of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) stormed the UUTH premises. They were there for what the anti‑graft agency later described as an “administrative” task: to authenticate a medical report linked to a suspect facing trial for allegedly defrauding several microfinance banks, including the University of Uyo Microfinance Bank. The EFCC said the suspect had presented a medical report in court, and investigators needed to verify its authenticity.
The hospital has a different version of events. Witnesses and medical staff told local media that the operatives arrived in two saloon cars and a tinted bus, with some officers wearing masks and others dressed in EFCC‑branded jackets. Their target was the Deputy Chairman of the Medical Advisory Committee, Professor Eyo Ekpe, a cardiothoracic surgeon who is the only specialist of his kind in the state. According to a communiqué issued by the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) after an emergency congress, Ekpe was physically assaulted, beaten to the point of bleeding, handcuffed and dragged out of his office. “They beat me severely and forced me into their van,” Ekpe later told Radio Nigeria. “I was not the one who issued the report. My name was not on it. But they refused to listen.”
Hospital staff who tried to intervene were also manhandled, witnesses said. The NMA alleged that teargas canisters were fired inside the hospital building, sending patients, relatives and medical personnel scrambling for safety. Live bullets were reportedly discharged. Five staff members, including Ekpe, were taken to the EFCC’s zonal command in Uyo. They were released hours later after the CMD personally intervened. “No hospital should ever become a theatre of violence,” Bassey wrote. “No healthcare worker should ever feel unsafe within the walls of a healing institution.”
The next day, the NMA’s Akwa Ibom State branch declared an indefinite, total strike. The association’s demands were non‑negotiable: the immediate release of all detained staff, an unreserved public apology from the EFCC, the identification and prosecution of the officers involved, and compensation for those injured. The NMA also announced plans to file a N1 billion lawsuit against the commission.
The strike shut down virtually all medical services at UUTH. The Accident and Emergency unit was locked. The Intensive Care Unit (ICU) stopped accepting new patients. Dialysis sessions were cancelled. Cancer patients, some of whom had travelled from neighbouring states, were turned away. A middle‑aged man reportedly died at the hospital’s Accident and Emergency Unit shortly after the strike began, adding to the growing list of casualties. By the weekend, the NMA agreed to a partial waiver, allowing state‑owned hospitals across Akwa Ibom to resume operations on humanitarian grounds. But the strike at UUTH continued. Doctors insisted that services would not be restored until the EFCC met their demands, including a written apology published in national newspapers.
The EFCC has denied all allegations of assault and unlawful arrest. In a statement released on Friday, 15 May, the commission said its operatives went to UUTH solely “to facilitate the authentication of a document, rather than a tactical operation to effect arrest.” The commission insisted that “no arrests were made” and that hospital staff who accompanied its operatives to the zonal command were “not detained.” The EFCC challenged the NMA and the hospital to provide evidence of brutality, noting that it had not seen “any physical evidence of such brutality in terms of bodily harm or injury to anyone, including to the staff members who addressed the media on this issue.”
Nevertheless, the EFCC ordered an internal investigation into the incident. “Any staff of the Commission found to have deviated from the Standard Operating Procedure of the Agency will not be spared,” the statement read. The commission also described the incident as “an aberration” and appealed to the public not to allow it to undermine the fight against corruption.
The Federal Government moved quickly to contain the fallout. The Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Professor Muhammad Pate, intervened personally. According to Bassey, the minister received a delegation from the EFCC that conveyed apologies to the hospital management. Pate also promised to establish a committee to investigate workplace violence and harassment against healthcare workers and to recommend measures to prevent future occurrences.
The Akwa Ibom State Government, through the Deputy Governor, Akon Eyakenyi, also convened a meeting involving health unions, hospital management and security agencies. The Deputy Governor reportedly conveyed further apologies to affected staff.
But the doctors remained unmoved. At an emergency congress over the weekend, the NMA resolved to continue the strike at UUTH while allowing other health facilities in the state to operate. The association noted that the EFCC had offered only an oral apology, and that it had failed to issue an “unreserved written apology and publish same in national dailies.” It also expressed concern over the commission’s “unwillingness to admit fault and adequately compensate all victims.” The NMA gave the EFCC a two‑week ultimatum to meet its demands, warning that all previously exempted facilities would be drawn into a full strike if the commission failed to comply.
By Monday, 18 May 2026, the hospital remained largely deserted. Patients who had nowhere else to go lingered in the corridors, uncertain whether the next nurse who walked in would be there to treat them or to pack up and leave. Dialysis machines stood idle. The ICU was quiet. In his Facebook post, Bassey appealed directly to the striking doctors. “Suspending the strike does not diminish the legitimacy of your grievances. Returning to work does not mean surrendering your dignity,” he wrote.
The EFCC has not commented on the NMA’s two‑week ultimatum. The commission’s internal investigation is ongoing. But as the sun sets on Uyo, the question that now hangs over the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital is not when the strike will end, but how many more patients must die before it does.
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