More than 1,500 environmental health professionals under the Environmental Health Council of Nigeria (EHCON) have gone unpaid for nearly 20 months, following a directive from the Federal Government to withdraw funding from selected regulatory bodies.
Established under Act 11 of 2002 (as amended), EHCON oversees environmental health regulations, disease prevention, and played key roles during the 2014 Ebola outbreak and the COVID-19 pandemic—implementing border health measures and decontamination protocols .
In 2023, the Budget Office issued a memo stating that certain agencies would transition to full self-funding, with all federal allocations to professional bodies and councils set to cease by December 2024 .
A list published that year included 26 councils for immediate defunding, yielding a projected savings of ₦27.72 billion . EHCON falls under the Ministry of Environment and was omitted from a later exemption list, leaving it with no allocation for 2024 .
In response, health agencies under the Ministry of Health secured over ₦6 billion in exemptions . However, EHCON’s employees were excluded. On April 30, 2025, Secretary to the Government George Akume petitioned President Tinubu to reconsider, emphasising EHCON’s role in public welfare and urging that allocations be restored .
The result: EHCON has been unable to fund salaries or operations for its staff since January 2024, plunging the agency and its workforce into severe financial hardship .
