Rotary International to Build Prostate Cancer Centre in Ogun State

By Sunday Ehigiator

The newly elected District Governor of Rotary International, District 9110 Nigeria, for the 2020/2021 rotary year, Rotarian Bola Oyebade, has revealed that his tenure is committed to deliver a state of the earth prostate cancer centre for the benefit of the people of Ogun State.

This is even as he has commenced free prostate cancer screening targeted at over 2000 men, and disbursement of N50,000 empowerment fund to community members within the district.

He made this known recently while addressing the media in preparation of his investiture that held last weekend.

“We want to screen about 2000 men that are above 40 years old. We are screening them for free. As of today, after spending about four months, we have screened over 700 already. So we still have about 1300 left to screen.

“On the other part is the prostate cancer center. We have a plot of land that has been donated to us by the Ogun State government. The land is seated at the Olabisi Onabanjo University Teaching Hospital.

“On that land, we are constructing a prostate cancer center. We have started already. We laid the foundation early November, and we hope we will be able to complete it by the end of April, 2021.

“Prostate cancer is a generic issue suffered by men, and treating it is just one thing I feel we can support the members of the community with. A lot of men die and they do not know that their death was caused by prostate cancer.”

On the cost of the centre, he said, “according to the estimate we did before bags of cement went up about three weeks ago, the building was going to cost us over N82 million.

“Right now we are trying to reevaluate the total cost, but for now we can only say it is far more than the N82 million earlier estimated.”

On how he intends to source funds for the project, he said, “We are sourcing for the project through friends. Rotarians are donating, our friends are donating from all over the country. We also have corporate bodies that are supporting us.”

Speaking on the empowerment project, Oyebade revealed that the N50,000 would only be given to traders whom the money would have a significant impact on their business.

“Another project which we want to do for this rotary year is empowerment to members of the community. We plan to give N50,000 each to any deserving indigent persons that are into one trade or the other which this amount would have significant impact on their trade

“So far, we have given about 26 persons, and we have about 34 persons ready to be empowered on November 28, when we would be having my installation. A total of 100 persons will benefit from this for the rotary year,” he said.