Stakeholders in Nigeria’s health sector have called for a locally driven and evidence-based health financing research strategy to guide reforms, expand health insurance coverage and strengthen financial protection for Nigerians.

The call was made on Monday in Abuja at the inaugural Nigeria Health Financing Research and Learning Forum, organised around the theme, “Evidence and Learning for Nigeria’s Health Financing Future: Building a Locally Led Research and Learning Ecosystem.”

The Director-General of the National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA), Dr Kelechi Ohiri, said Nigeria must take greater ownership of the research used to shape its health financing policies and reforms.

Ohiri said reliance on occasional, externally driven studies had made it difficult for the country to build a sustained evidence base capable of supporting long-term reforms.

“For too long, our health financing initiatives in Nigeria have been shaped by well-meant studies designed, commissioned, analysed, reported, synthesised and presented to us at the finish line,” he said.

He noted that while such studies had provided valuable insights, episodic research could not provide the enduring policy foundation required to sustain health financing reforms.

According to him, Nigeria must move towards a system where it determines its own research priorities, commissions studies based on identified needs and integrates findings directly into policy implementation.

Ohiri clarified that research sovereignty did not mean cutting Nigeria off from international partners.

“Research sovereignty doesn’t mean isolating ourselves from support and partners globally, but rather it means putting Nigeria in the driver’s seat in terms of defining our own questions, pushing to commission our own research, embedding learning directly into implementation,” he said.

He added that international partnerships should increasingly focus on strengthening Nigeria’s domestic research capacity and supporting priorities determined within the country.

NHIA identifies key health financing priorities
Ohiri said the two-day forum would review five NHIA-commissioned studies focused on embedded learning, while also examining health financing experiences from Ethiopia, Ghana and India.

He stressed that the forum was designed not only for researchers but also for policymakers and other stakeholders involved in implementing health reforms.

“This forum is not an academic exercise. It’s not held in isolation. It doesn’t cater to just the researchers, but it’s also one that policymakers can benefit from,” he said.

The NHIA boss identified mandatory health insurance coverage, equity, quality of care and sustainability as major areas of focus in the authority’s health financing research agenda.

He disclosed that the authority had identified 15 studies linked to its strategic priorities and was working with national research institutions, universities and other stakeholders to develop a stronger health financing research ecosystem.

Ohiri also drew attention to the fragmented nature of Nigeria’s health insurance system, noting that the country currently has 37 government health insurance schemes and more than 95 private health insurance companies.

“That has resulted in a lot of fragmented things that question sustainability. And so one of the areas of our research focus is really how do we enhance the sustainability of health insurance and financial protection,” he said.

As part of efforts to institutionalise research and learning, the NHIA is planning a national health financing observatory, a national research agenda for health financing, 15 research action plans and regional collaboration frameworks.

Ohiri said evidence must directly support reforms aimed at expanding health insurance coverage, improving healthcare quality and strengthening financial protection for households.

“Evidence must serve reform,” he said, stressing that health financing should evolve into an economic infrastructure capable of protecting Nigerian households from the financial consequences of healthcare needs.

WHO backs locally led research
The World Health Organisation (WHO) Representative in Nigeria, Dr Pavel Ursu, described health financing as fundamental to achieving universal health coverage.

Ursu said implementation research was particularly important because it could help policymakers answer practical questions emerging from ongoing health sector reforms.

He commended the establishment of the Nigeria Health Financing Research and Learning Forum, describing it as an institutional opportunity for Nigeria to translate global commitments on health financing and universal health coverage into concrete actions.

“The establishment of the Nigeria Health Financing Research and Learning Forum platform is really a great institutional opportunity, which will help us to a great extent with really unpacking the research questions and increasingly drive Nigeria’s own policy and implementation steps,” he said.

NISER calls for continuous national learning
Representing the Nigerian Institute of Social and Economic Research (NISER), Dr Yetunde Aluko said Nigeria needed locally generated evidence to guide health financing decisions.

She argued that research should become part of a continuous national learning system involving policymakers, researchers, healthcare practitioners, communities and those responsible for implementing policies.

“For too long, research in many development sectors has been developed outside of Nigeria and is funded by short-term grants,” Aluko said.

While acknowledging the value of development partnerships, she said Nigeria needed an enduring national system through which stakeholders could jointly identify priority research questions, generate evidence, learn from implementation and continuously adapt policies.

Aluko said health financing research should go beyond producing reports and academic publications.

She said research should establish what interventions work, who benefits, the circumstances under which they work and the cost involved, while also considering equity and sustainability.

GIZ highlights social factors affecting healthcare decisions
Also speaking on behalf of development partners, GIZ Cluster Manager and Head of Programme, Fatima Zannah, said locally generated evidence was necessary to design health financing approaches that reflected the realities of Nigerians.

She noted that culture, religion, geography, income, education, gender and social networks all influenced how people accessed healthcare and made decisions about treatment.

“These realities shape the choices that people make about their care. We need to better understand how Nigerians find, where and how they seek care, and what influences barriers to the decisions that they are making,” Zannah said.

She urged stakeholders to apply evidence to strengthen decision-making, transparency, equity and accountability within the health system.

Zannah also encouraged Nigeria to learn from countries facing similar health financing challenges while developing solutions suited to its own circumstances.

WHO Alliance urges Nigeria to build domestic research capacity
The Executive Director of the WHO Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research, Dr Kumanan Rasanathan, said research and learning should be treated as essential components of a functioning health system rather than optional activities.

“Research cannot be a luxury. Learning cannot be a luxury. It is the foundation for health systems. If you don’t have your own knowledge, if you don’t know your own problems, if that is not preserved for future generations, you cannot be sovereign,” Rasanathan said.

He expressed concern over the dependence of research institutions in developing countries on external funding, warning that declining development assistance could weaken domestic knowledge systems.

Rasanathan called for stronger national institutions capable of generating, preserving and applying knowledge while maintaining links with policymakers and providing independent advice.

He said Nigeria’s emerging health financing research ecosystem should increasingly be driven by nationally and sub-nationally determined priorities and supported by institutions capable of sustaining continuous learning.

“If you don’t have your own research and learning system, you don’t have a map. And if someone else owns the map, you’re certainly not in charge of your journey,” he said.

The stakeholders agreed that a stronger locally led research system would be critical to helping Nigeria design health financing reforms that respond to its own realities, improve access to healthcare and provide greater financial protection for households.

The Rural Electrification Agency (REA) has called for stronger coordination among government agencies, state governments, development partners, private operators and other stakeholders to accelerate electricity access across Nigeria.

The Managing Director of the REA, Dr Abba Abubakar Aliyu, made the call on Monday in Abuja at the official relaunch of the Off-Grid Stakeholder Coordination and Partnership Forum.

Aliyu said greater collaboration was necessary to prevent duplication of electricity projects, optimise limited resources and ensure that interventions reached communities and Nigerians with the greatest need for access to electricity.

According to him, an analysis of the 2024 and 2025 Federal Government budgets using Artificial Intelligence showed that several government institutions were implementing power-related projects, making stronger coordination across the sector increasingly important.

He noted that some of the institutions involved in electricity-related projects were not traditionally regarded as major players in the power sector.

Aliyu warned that failing to bring state governments into a coordinated national framework could undermine efforts to expand electricity access.

“If we continue to work the way we currently do without bringing the states into this conversation and coordination, I can tell you that we will simply be planning to fail.”

The REA boss disclosed that the agency had itself encountered instances where projects being implemented under different programmes overlapped in the same locations.

He said the challenge had become more critical as funding available to the electricity sector continued to decline, stressing the need for stakeholders to share data and coordinate interventions.

Aliyu advocated the creation of a centralised sector data platform that would enable stakeholders to identify existing projects, prevent duplication and determine locations where new interventions were most needed.

FG moves to strengthen off-grid coordination
In his keynote address, the Minister of Power, Joseph Tegbe, represented by his Chief of Staff, Doyin Adelabu, identified fragmentation as a major obstacle to effective electricity project delivery.

Tegbe said the Federal Government was establishing a standing Off-Grid Coordination Secretariat to track commitments and risks, convene issue-based working groups and generate shared market intelligence.

He described poor coordination as a hidden cost to the sector, noting that duplication of efforts and missed investment opportunities could slow the delivery of electricity to underserved communities.

The minister urged development partners, financiers, private operators, state governments and civil society organisations to nominate focal points, share relevant data and commitments, and participate actively in the working groups.

He added that the Federal Ministry of Power would continue to provide policy direction through the National Electrification Strategy and Implementation Plan while supporting the development of state electricity markets under the Electricity Act.

REA calls for continuous stakeholder engagement
The Executive Director of the Rural Electrification Fund, Doris Uboh-Ogunkoya, said coordination should become a continuous function rather than an activity restricted to periodic stakeholder meetings.

She said the Off-Grid Coordination Secretariat would provide a mechanism for stakeholders to identify gaps, address implementation bottlenecks and monitor commitments.

“The aim is not simply to hold more meetings, but to align our efforts, identify gaps, address bottlenecks, and follow through on commitments between meetings,” she said.

Also speaking at the forum, the Heinrich Böll Stiftung Nigeria representative, Ikenna-Donald Ofoegbu, urged stakeholders to broaden the way the success of off-grid electricity projects was measured.

Ofoegbu said while the number of mini-grids installed, solar home systems deployed and connections delivered remained important indicators, stakeholders should pay greater attention to what happens after communities gain access to electricity.

He called for more emphasis on productive use of electricity, innovative financing mechanisms, sustainability and the development of local capacity.

According to him, the sector needs to move from individual successful interventions to projects capable of achieving scale, from connections to productive economic activities, and from donor-supported projects to investable markets.

Over 7.5 million Nigerians gain electricity access through off-grid projects
The Off-Grid Stakeholder Coordination and Partnership Forum began as a donor roundtable in April 2017 and is now being relaunched under a new coordination framework.

The Federal Government said more than 7.5 million Nigerians had gained electricity access through over 200 solar hybrid mini-grids and approximately 1.8 million solar home system connections.

It added that the Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Scale-Up programme is targeting an additional 17 million Nigerians and about 465 megawatts of new renewable energy capacity.

Nigeria is also participating in the broader Mission 300 initiative, which aims to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030.

The renewed coordination framework is expected to bring government institutions, state authorities, development partners, private-sector operators, financiers and civil society organisations into a more integrated approach to expanding electricity access, particularly in underserved and unserved communities across the country.

The Nigeria Association of Auctioneers, Jigawa State chapter, has called for a strategic partnership with the state government to strengthen the disposal of government assets, block revenue leakages and improve internally generated revenue.

The association made the request during a courtesy visit to the Jigawa State Head of Service, Muhammad Dagaceri, on Friday in Dutse.

Chairman of the association in Jigawa, Abubakar Abdullahi, said closer collaboration between auctioneers and the government would promote transparency in the auctioning of state-owned assets and ensure that proceeds from such sales were fully remitted into government coffers.

Abdullahi said the proposed partnership would also ensure that government assets earmarked for disposal were sold through competitive processes capable of securing better value for the state.

According to him, professional auctioneers could help the government eliminate leakages by ensuring that assets were properly valued, competitively auctioned and that proceeds were accounted for.

He said, “Our collaboration will ensure that state assets are auctioned efficiently, securing optimal deals, and ensuring all proceeds are remitted directly to state coffers.”

The chairman further highlighted the contribution of auctioneers to the economic development of Jigawa State, saying members had over the years supported efforts aimed at building a strong and sustainable economy.

He appealed to the state government to formally recognise auctioneers as key stakeholders in the asset disposal process, arguing that their professional and transparent approach would improve the outcome of government auctions.

Abdullahi also said the association had regained unity after previous divisions, describing the development as important to the effective discharge of its responsibilities.

“This can be achieved when the association is united, and I want to assure you that the association is now one in Jigawa State,” he said.

He added, “We are appealing for the government to accept auctioneers as partners in ensuring that all State assets auctioned get a better deal and the monies realised from the sales get to the coffers of the state government.”

The chairman also expressed the association’s political support for Governor Umar Namadi, saying its members were working with stakeholders at the grassroots and would support the governor’s bid for a second term.

Responding, the Head of Service, Muhammad Dagaceri, commended the auctioneers for their initiative and assured them of the state government’s willingness to work with the association.

Dagaceri said the administration of Governor Umar Namadi was committed to strengthening transparency and accountability while improving the state’s revenue base.

He welcomed the renewed unity among members of the association, describing it as essential to maintaining transparency in the auction process.

“The unity of members of the association is very critical in ensuring that transparency and accountability is in place while discharging their responsibilities,” he said.

The Head of Service noted that a united association would contribute to efforts to block revenue leakages, improve public confidence and strengthen the integrity of the state’s asset disposal process.

He said the Namadi administration would continue to partner with professional bodies that could contribute to transparency, accountability and increased revenue generation for the development of Jigawa State.

Dagaceri urged the auctioneers to sustain their unity and adhere strictly to professional ethics as the government intensifies efforts to improve revenue generation across the state.