The Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU), an umbrella body of health workers in Nigeria, has alleged that the strike embarked upon by the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) and the Nigeria Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) is another plot for the striking doctors to corner patients in public hospitals to their private hospitals.

 

It accused NMA of using blackmail to coerce and intimidate the government to enter into an illegal agreement.

 

Accordingly, it maintained its stance that the industrial action which commenced on Tuesday, July 1 is an illegal action and the federal government must not yield to the demands prompting it, even as it argued vehemently that the NMA, MDCAN and NARD are not trade unions and as such, lack the legal right to negotiate trade disputes with government for any reason.

 

In a statement it issued yesterday, JOHESU, while urging Nigerians to imagine what could have been more callous and insensitive than the strike action embarked upon by the doctors at a critical moment in the country’s history, said its response became necessary because of certain publications in the mdia by NMA which would have been ignored “for obvious lack of credence and immaturity aptly demonstrated by the NMA and its appendages.

 

“On a second thought, the leadership of JOHESU, considered the inherent danger such malice, misinformation, such publications if not corrected, could impact on the uninformed public and resolved to respond, if only to refute the unguarded and unprofessional utterances of the groups, not to mention the level of absurdity the issues raised epitomize, which further stretched the incredibility to an agonizing crescendo”, it added.

 

JOHESU described a recent attack by NMA on the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) for not supporting its bid to improve on the poor state of the nation’s health sector which, it said, was being mismanaged by the medical doctors, as baseless and a clear demonstration of NMA’s attempt to cover up the rot in the sector.

 

Challenging the legality of the NMA to embark on the strike when it was not a trade union, JOHESU said, “Both Labour Centres, NLC and TUC, have as affiliates all the five-member unions of JOHESU, all of them registered by the Trade Union Acts and the extant laws.

 

“NMA and its groups are not registered trade unions, yet are known to engage in trade union activities, by negotiating conditions of service and most often inciting the government against the rest of the health practitioners given their privileged leadership position in the sector.