FG moves to avert doctors’ strike fails as strike commences

01 Apr FG moves to avert doctors’ strike fails as strike commences

The federal government on Wednesday moved to avert a strike by doctors which was set to commence on today. But it seems to have failed as the doctors commenced strike this morning

Yesterday, the government appealed to the doctors, members of the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD), to consider the plight of millions of Nigerians that will be adversely affected and shelve the planned strike.

The NARD threatened to commence an ‘indefinite strike’ on Thursday if the Nigerian government fails to meet its demands.

At a reconciliatory meeting on Wednesday in Abuja, labour minister Chris Ngige, who led the government delegation, appealed to the aggrieved doctors to consider the damage their withdrawal of services would cause on the country’s health system already besieged by the coronavirus.

Before the meeting went into a closed session, he said the majority of the welfare issues under contention were almost resolved even before the letter of complaint and notification of planned strike action was delivered to the ministry.

He said: “We are here because we have started solving your issues. We put up proposals with given timelines on how to deal with them. We will look at those proposals with you, fix adequate timelines so that the people on government side will be implementing and marking them as they execute them.

“I have held informal meetings with the finance ministry and they told me they have started solving some of the problems, the two committees in the National Assembly have also tried to get you and your employers on same page. We have to intervene to ensure industrial peace in the health industry.

“We are in a very bad period health wise; the world over and Nigeria is not an exception so, we have to think about the generality of Nigerians because right now, 80 per cent of Nigerians are our patients because of the COVID-19 pandemic so we have to look at the issues that way and see how we can get the best out of this situation.”

Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Health, Abdullahi Mashi, who represented his ministers, appealed to the doctors to reconsider the planned strike.

“Most of the issues are almost solved the only thing remaining is to get the commitment of NARD to suspend the strike action. All efforts are being put in Place,” the permanent secretary said.

NARD President Dr. Uyilawa Okhuaihesuyi said his colleagues were looking forward to resolving all issues and grievances during the meeting.