IBADAN—Former Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and businessman, Chief Tony Anenih, has endowed the first-ever multi-million naira Geriatric Centre at the University College Hospital, UCH, Ibadan.

Anenih said that his acceptance of the hospital management’s request to endow the centre was predicated on the conviction that “the only life worth living is the life lived in service to God and humanity.”

Chief Medical Director of the UCH, Professor Temitope Alonge, said the management of the hospital unanimously agreed at a meeting in July, this year, on the choice of Anenih as the endower of the Centre.

He said: “At the core management meeting of the hospital held in July 2012, management unanimously agreed on the choice of Chief Tony Anenih, CFR, the Iyasele of Esanland as the most suitable Nigerian to endow this centre, the very first of such in Nigeria.”

He said that the centre was designed to provide outpatient and in-patient services for the increasing number of geriatric clients (people aged 65 and above).

Alonge disclosed that the formal commissioning of the centre, which will be christened “Chief Tony Anenih Geriatric Centre” would take place on Saturday, November 17, 2012.

He explained that the management got the idea to endow the Centre from the Minister of Health, Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, during his recent visit to the hospital.

He said the minister reaffirmed the Federal Government’s drive for Public Private Partnership (PPP) in government institutions, including endowment of government projects by well-meaning Nigerians and philanthropists.

“This will ultimately dovetail into the naming of such projects after the endower,” he added.