A women's ward at Juba Teaching Hospital | File Photo

Some civil society leaders are calling for the resignation of the minister of health in Jubek state after the latest death at the al-Sabah Children’s Hospital in Juba.

On Monday, a father described to Eye Radio how he lost his baby at the public health facility.

Peter Madol said his 8-month-old baby boy died in his arms after the management switched off the generator in the middle of the night nearly 3 weeks ago.

Prior to this incident, another father – Rajab Muhandis – attributed the death of his new-born to nursing negligence.

Both the management of al-Sabah Children’s Hospital and Jubek ministry of health which supervises the health facility described these allegations as false.

However, some of the civil society leaders who visited the hospital after Eye Radio reported on the incidents say the minister of health should resign.

Wani Michael is the executive director of Okay Africa Foundation. He says that the hospital is in dire need of support.

“For me it’s really disappointing to see Jubek state minister of health coming out through eye radio and saying this are false allegations. This are not false allegations. If you go to that hospital you can see the condition are really needs attention from the government to put serious investment in that particular hospital.”

He said the ministers’ failure to deliver services to the people of the state is reason enough for him to tender his resignation.

“He should honorably resign from his work as minister of health because you cannot play with people’s lives. You cannot tell people that this are all rubbish , this are all false accusations and people have lost their children. You cannot tell me as a parent that my child died because of negligence.”

For his part, Edmund Yakani, the executive director for Community Empowerment for Progress Organization, said that after a series of follow up, it was confirmed that power is usually switched off at midnight despite children being on oxygen to survive.

“There is a problem in AL sabah hospital in terms of their operation. It is really true that at midnight you cannot find somebody and maybe at the level of minster this may not be real…I have been listening to it for a while that power is switched off , when a child is on oxygen. All this is legitimate concern.

The minister of health in Jubek State – Dr Sayli Lo-Ladu – is yet to comment on the call to step down.