The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Ultimate Health HMO, Dr. Lekan Ewenla, has called for swift and strategic actions to implement Nigeria’s mandatory health insurance policy and achieve universal health coverage for all citizens. He made this call at the 2025 Business Day health conference in Abuja.
The conference theme was “Transforming Nigeria’s healthcare landscape: Government reforms as catalysts for unlocking full potential of the healthcare value chain.”
Ewenla noted that the National Health Insurance Scheme Act 35 of 1999 primarily focused on the formal sector, excluding 80-85% of Nigerians, including informal sector workers and vulnerable groups.
“It is on record that apart from the federal civil servants who are mandatorily enrolled on the programme, the enrolment on all other developed programmes was neither here nor there, which led to the need to come up with another law to make enrolment mandatory for all Nigerians and legal residents,” he said. “This law was passed on May 19th, 2022, over three years now.”
Ewenla highlighted key provisions of the 2022 Act, including the NHIA’s mandate to promote, integrate, and regulate all health insurance schemes, enforce a basic minimum package of health services nationwide, and undertake sustained public education on the benefits of health coverage.
To accelerate enrollment, Ewenla recommended a nationwide strategic media campaign to boost public awareness. He also suggested that the NHIA management should embark on coding and approving actuarially designed benefit packages for accredited Health Maintenance Organizations.
“The NHIA management should embark on the coding and approval of actuarially designed and developed benefit packages of the accredited Health Maintenance Organizations,” he said. “This step will stem the tide of the poor claims settlements approach of some health maintenance organizations and gradually eliminate the issue of requests for letters of non-indebtedness from the Health Care Facilities, which was an offshoot of the poor claims settlement issue on the part of some of the Health Maintenance Organizations.”
Ewenla also emphasized the need for the NHIA Governing Council and management to strengthen their interface with the Governors Forum to achieve universal health coverage across the 36 states and the FCT.
“The NHIA Governing Council and the management will need to strengthen the interface and relationship with the Governors Forum to directly drive home and achieve the implementation of the Universal Health Coverage across the 36 states of the federation and the FCT,” he said.
On the role of Health Maintenance Organizations, Ewenla stressed the need for the sector to speak with one strong voice, self-regulate effectively, and enforce a code of conduct to rebuild public trust.
