It has been 62 days since the National Joint Health Sector Union & Assembly of Health Care Professionals declared an industrial strike action on the 12th of November 2014.

 

This strike action was taken due to the Governments refusal to fully implement the agreement freely entered into by the Federal Governments with JOHESU and their refusal to implement the judement of the National Industrial Court of Nigeria (NICN) delivered on July 22nd 2013.

 

As previously reported on Nursingworld Nigeria, federal health workers joined the strike action when it was first limited to the teaching hospital but when it was observed that the Federal Government was dragging its foot and wasn't making any concessions, the strike action was expanded to include healthcare workers in the state and local governments healthcare facilities.

 

In various states across the federation, most Nurses report that they are being threatened with the loss of their jobs and being ordered back to work with the words "if  you like you resume..." and others with the no work no pay circular by some Hospital CMD's/Managements.

 

 

It could be recalled that in Lagos State no fewer than 1,000 health workers from Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH) took to the streets in protest of their unpaid December salaries. The workers, majority of who are middle-aged women, had downed tools in the last six weeks in solidarity with JOHESU national body.  Raising banners of protest, nurses, pharmacists, laboratory technicians, mid-wives among others, matched from the LASUTH complex down to the Office of the Head of Service at the Lagos Secretariat, chanting solidarity songs.

 

The Chairman of the union and leader of the protest Rasheed Bamise when intervied noted that only about 10 per cent of their members, numbering about 300, out of the 3,000 work force, were paid for the month of December while the rest were left out. It was gathered that the 300 paid workers were those that worked during the period while others were denied pay in accordance with the State’s “no work, no pay” policy. Bamise, however, argued that they were members of a union (JOHESU) that had complied with the directive of the national body to embark on a strike.

 

At the end of it all, the Lagos Head of Service, Josephine Williams who appeared stressed that the ‘No work, no pay’ policy would still be applied for as long as the healthcare workers remain on strike.

 

Before a closed door meeting was held at the National Association Of Nigerian Nurses and Midwives secretariat in Portharcourt, Rivers state , a Nursingworld correspondent had a few minutes with a source from the body where he had the chance to get an impromtu interview. The source who would choose to remain anonimous 

 

bemoaned the attitude of the Federal Government and some states to the plight of Nurses and other healthcare professions stressing that Nurses are underappreciated and overworked in the country. She stated that its a fact that Nurses perform close to 90% of the care in the Healthcare system but are paid "peanuts" for their efforts.

 

On the progress of the strike action, she had this to say:

"...the Federal Government is still dragging its foot at this moment and hasn't made any effort yet to meet the demands of JOHESU, but we are still on course with the strike action. Its unbeleivable that even though they dont want to accede to our demands they are asking for us to resume work prior to the February 14th 2015 general elections in case there is any violence across the nation! Our answer to this was 'if you need us to resume work then accede to our demands and the strike ends or not and it continues'. To my fellow Nurses across the country this is the time to be given what is rightfully ours, its best for us to go through all this at this moment in time and stick to our course till the end than to accept any less and in a few years go through this all again."

 

"To all who are part of this strike action, thank you for your suport and understanding, to those who are undermining our efforts by colluding with the various CMD's and hospital managements all we can say is your actions are being noted"

 

In other news, the Kaduna State branch of JOHESU recently passed a circular on joining the Strike action in the health sector as they had delayed the commencement of it due to the influx of victims of the insurgency seeking medical care in crises local government areas. They asked all members to join the action starting from 12 midnight 11th of January 2014.

 

By Avalon

Nursingworld Nigeria