After much intrigues, the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) has called
off its eight-week-old industrial action, which started on July 1, saying the
decision was in response to ongoing concerns about the Ebola Virus Disease
(EVD) and related issues. Announcing the development to newsmen in Abuja
yesterday, NMA President, Kayode Obembe, urged doctors to resume work today,
while calling on government to recall the sacked resident doctors. The
association, which had met over the past one week, considered the suspension of
the residency programme and it’s likely effect on the doctors aspiring to be
consultants, as well as the need for doctors to support government’s efforts to
stem the Ebola outbreak. On its part, the Federal Government is expected to
recall the resident doctors it sacked in the course of the strike. And relieved
at last, the Minister of Health, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, has expressed joy that
the strike has been called off. According to his Special Assistant on Media and
Communications, Dan Nwomeh, the minister of expressed happiness with the
development. However, a group, Health Initiative Platform, has dismissed the
indefinite suspension of residency training and sack of all the 16,000 resident
doctors in all federal health institutions as diversionary and political,
adding that Chukwu betrayed his profession by that act.
Guardian Newspaper
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