Just like the biblical PILATE, l want to, for the sake of posterity, wash my hands off this professional sciatica, orchestrated by the registrar of the Radiographers Registration Board of Nigeria (RRBN). It is a known legal principle that you cannot place something on nothing and expect it to stand. 

 

The law that established radiography as a profession in Nigeria made it an umbrella body for many medical imaging procedures. The Radiographers Registration Act, in its opening section, PART 1 NUMBER 1, made it clear that it is for RADIOGRAPHERS. It is from this law that the Board derives her powers. Universities in Nigeria offer radiography and radiological sciences or medical radiography etc as first degree courses. Postgraduate courses are offered in medical imaging with diversification in many areas of medical imaging. In view of the popularity that ULTRASONOGRAPHY has enjoined in Nigeria, majority of Radiographers have shown biases for medical ultrasound. The RRBN has also been offering POSTBASIC trainings in ultrasonography. 

 

Based on the Act which made this Board a radiographers' Board, training and certifications can only be validly and reliably offered, for the purposes of legality, to radiographers.  The scheme of service currently in use in Nigeria defined a radiographer based on B.Sc or B. Rad. The legal implication is that if you are not a radiographer by this definition, you cannot validly be certified in a POSTBASIC specialty by our Board irrespective of your foreign training or other qualifications. This is the position of the law and hence the choice of RADIOGRAPHERS in the name of the Board instead of RADIOGRAPHY. 

 

In view of the above explanations, any certificate or empowerment given by this Board to any non radiographer cannot stand as a legal instrument in the event of any litigation against the user. This certificate cannot also be validly used to practice in Nigeria if the Act is amended to incorporate non radiographers as laws do not take retroactive effect. 

 

As an academic radiographer and a civil rights crusader, l decided to make this issue clear so that those already enrolled can either seek a refund or bear in mind that they are either on a simple academic exercise or a FRUITLESS journey.  

 

Similarly, in my recent article on sonography and medical imaging training purportedly being accredited in schools of health technology by the National Board for Technical Education , NBTE, l drew attention to the illegality of such exercise. I made it clear that the NBTE Act in Nigeria only empowered NBTE to coordinate technical and vocational education in Nigeria and not medical imaging or sonography education.  Hence, accreditations for wrong programmes are illegal and certificates from such programmes cannot stand as evidences in court. Just as l call on parents to seek proper information before allowing their children enrol into programmes, l also beseech all radiographers to call for immediate arrest of any laboratory scientist, anatomist,  Engineer, Agric educationist, lawyer etc who carries out ultrasound investigations under the cover of a certification from RRBN. 

 

Thank you. 

 

DR ANTHONY UGWU,  KSM. 

LECTURER AND CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST