A delegation from the Lagos State Government led by the Commissioner for Health, Prof. Akin Abayomi and the Director General of the Lagos State Safety Commission, Mr. Lanre Mojola has visited the Synagogue Church of All Nations, SCOAN, to inspect facilities at the church for COVID safety and prevention protocols compliance in preparation for the funeral of it late founder, Prophet Temitope Joshua.

Funeral rites for the Prophet, popularly known as TB Joshua who died on the 6th of last month are scheduled to begin from tomorrow, the 5th of July with a candle light procession, while his remains would be interred on 9th and a thanksgiving service would be held the on the 11th.

 

The team from

The Delegation

the State Government in company of officials from Federal Ministry of Health’s Port Health Services inspected the auditorium, marquee tent, hostel accommodation for international guests and sanitary facilities

In an interview, Prof Abayomi explained that the inspection and meeting with officials of SCOAN was at the behest of the Lagos State Governor who directed that the Church be given all the support required to host the funeral programme for it late founder.

The Commissioner pointed out that the Lagos State Government considers the funeral activities at SCOAN an important event which must be held under strict COVID prevention protocol to limit any possibilities of introduction of foreign COVID variants among the congregation and by extension to the community and Nigeria in general.

Prof Abayomi engaging some SCOAN Members

He said: “So we have had series of engagements with the officials and executive of SCOAN, we are also in touch with the Federal Government; the Presidential Steering Committee and the Federal Ministry of Health, we’ve engaged with several stakeholders, we are looking at the airport, we are looking at the land borders, we are looking at event preceding the five or seven days of the funeral, we are looking at the funeral activities itself, we have a detailed account of the programme, we are putting some guidelines in place”

“Any visitor coming into the country has to go through the mandatory seven days of isolation plus testing before they can participate in any of the activities. We’ve inspected all the accommodation, we’ve looked at the auditorium and we’ve calculated how to completely eliminate the chance and the risk of infectious transmission”, the Commissioner stated.

While noting that there are some areas of infection prevention protocols that needed strengthening in the church, Prof Abayomi assured that those areas would be strengthened before and during the funeral activities, while biosecurity and safety experts would also be on ground to work with the local organizing committee to monitor and ensure safety of attendees.

He said: “In collaboration with the Lagos State Safety Commission and the Biosecurity Unit of the Ministry of Health, we’ve seen some areas that needs strengthening, we’ve been observing these for some days now and we are strengthening the protocols, so that as events are leading up to the seven days and during the seven days, we will have marshals on ground, we will have biosecurity experts on ground, will continuously monitor the situation and work with SCOAN to make sure we can keep this place safe and keep the congregation safe and keep Lagosian safe”

RADIO NIGERIA

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