The workers of the Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital (EKSUTH) Ado-Ekiti have threatened industrial action if the management failed to reverse the mass sack of staff in the hospital. It will be recalled that about 200 workers of the hospital were sacked by the management on new year eve but some have been reinstated by the management.

 

Addressing journalists on Thursday, the chairperson, Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU), Comrade Omotola Farotimi said the strike was originally set to commence on Friday(today), but the management of the hospital had been given three days extension for the management to have a rethink over the issue.

 

Farotimi said the management was given the opportunity to enter into a memorandum of understanding with the labour, which she insisted must be backed with a letter to extract assurances that all the sacked workers will be recalled before shelving the strike.

“We have given the management another extension of three days and it will end on Sunday, December 12 and if nothing is done before that day, there will be a total shutdown of the system at EKSUTH from Monday, January 13. “The management said they have told some workers to return to their duty posts, but we don’t want verbal assurance, let them back it with a letter and this must be done before Sunday.

 

“We thank God that the engagement we had with the management is yielding positive results. Those compulsorily retired has been recalled and we want others who were illegally sacked to return to work to guarantee industrial harmony.”

 

Farotimi faulted the disengagement of some workers on the strength that they were employed in 2018 when there was an embargo on employment.

 

“They said those that were employed between  July and  December 2018 were illegal workers because there was embargo then on employment. These workers were given letters of disengagement on December 31st. We asked for the memo about the embargo, but none was produced.

 

“It is sad that workers in some critical areas in the health sector were sacked based on these flimsy excuses, ” she said. She revealed that the imbroglio has affected services in the hospital, adding that patients were at the receiving end of the current impasse.

 

Also speaking, the organised labour through the Secretary of the joint Negotiating Council, Comrade Gbenga Olowoyo, said there may be sympathy strike from other sectors of the civil service should government allows the strike to commence.

 

“The extension was made by labour to follow due process. We are not fighting the government but management of EKSUTH, who are surreptitiously dealing with our people on a daily basis.

 

” We are giving a total backing to this proposed strike, because you can’t hoodwink people with a stage-managed report, it has to be evaluated. That was the mistake they made at EKSU where lecturers were mistakenly captured on the sack list, because the report was not reviewed. They forgot they were dealing with human beings and not animals.

 

“There will be sympathy strike from all workers, because they are unhappy about the way our people were given sack letters on December 31st when they were in celebration mood. They want us to resort to suicide, we won’t allow that to happen, ” he said.