Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) is a Knowledge Institution, being a non-governmental, non-profit and non-partisan organisation registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission as a Charity. It was established to introduce professionalism in civil society work and to use social entrepreneurship to provide cutting edge services to enhance and deepen economic, social and political change. It is a Company Limited by Guarantee under Nigerian law.

Centre for Social Justice, in implementing the “Improving the Realization of the Right to Health in Nigeria”  under the SCALE Project of USAID, is carrying out awareness and sensitization on the Nigerian Patients’ Bill of Rights. The Patients’ Bill of Rights is taken from the National Health Act and other relevant human rights standards. However, awareness about the Bill is very low. CSJ intends to raise awareness and sensitization on the Patients’ Bill of Rights by producing a handbook on the Bill and then engaging consultants to translate the handbook into Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba Languages. The Bill of Rights will be published as a handbook in English language and translated into Nigeria’s three major languages – Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba. Interested individuals with requisite qualifications are hereby invited to send in their applications for the role of consultant to translate the handbook into any of the 3 major Nigerian Languages.

BACKGROUND

The right to health is an inalienable right which is linked to the most fundamental of human rights – the right to life. Nigeria is a member of the United Nations and is a signatory to a number of international standards that provide for ensuring that everyone lives a decent and meaningful live, including the right to health. Upholding this right starts with the realization by the people that such rights are in existence.  A situation where patients are entitled to certain rights but the patients are unaware of these entitlements leads to a scenario where these rights can be violated and the patient will not seek redress.

The Sustainable Development Goal 3 focuses on ensuring healthy lives and promoting well-being for all persons at all ages. It targets to improve global health statistics across various health indicators ranging from maternal mortality, child and infant mortality; epidemics of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and neglected tropical diseases; deaths from substance and narcotic drug abuse and harmful alcohol usage; and death and illnesses from hazardous chemicals and all forms of pollution. Achieving all of the above in Nigeria or any place else would require a consciousness by the patients that they have certain rights as guaranteed by the National Health Act and other international standards.     

The Consumer Protection Council (CPC) is the agency of the Federal Government with the mandate to protect consumer rights. The CPC, other stakeholders, and the Federal Ministry of Health, have developed the Patients’ Bill of Rights for the protection of consumers. The PBoR is an aggregation of patients’ rights that exist in other instruments including, the Constitution, Consumer Protection Act, Child Rights Act, Freedom of Information Act, National Health Act, the Hippocratic Oath, other professional ethical codes and sundry regulations. Patients’ rights include access to information, patient-related information, fee-related information, confidentiality, quality of care, patients’ dignity, access to emergency care, visitation, refusal of care, complaints, to be informed about interruption of care by provider, etc. Each patient’s right is accompanied by patient responsibilities and provider responsibilities. However, the patients are not aware of these rights and consequently do not seek redress when these rights are violated. Some patients who are aware of these rights may be ignorant of the responsibilities that accompany the rights, while some healthcare providers are ignorant of their responsibilities to the patient. There is a lot of ignorance around the Patients’ Bill of Rights and this ignorance is caused by the absence of sensitization and awareness on the Patients Bill of Rights. 

This provides the background upon which Centre for Social Justice wishes to translate the handbook on the Patients’ Bill of Rights into the 3 major Nigerian languages – Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa. The output of this activity would serve as a tool for sensitization and awareness on the Patient’s Bill of Rights, and this will contribute positively towards the realization of the right to health.

TERMS OF REFERENCE (TOR)

The consultants will translate the English language version of the handbook into Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba. Three (3) consultants will be engaged and each of them will translate the handbook into a local language

Key Deliverable

Local language version of the handbook. This will be delivered in the form of a softcopy. 

QUALIFICATIONS

The successful candidate would possess:

• A relevant Bachelor’s degree/HND
• A Master’s Degree would be an advantage.
• Relevant experience in translating documents between English and local language
• Track record of similar consultancies within the development space

Interested applicants should send in their CVs to censojprocurement@gmail.com on or before 25^th October 2023 (before 5pm). Only shortlisted candidates would be contacted.