Save our healthcare system, resident doctors plead with PBT
Worried by what they perceive as government’s non-implementation of their 19-point demands,” the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) has taken its case to President Bola Tinubu for his direct personal intervention.
In a letter entitled, ‘A Passionate Appeal to the Commander-in-Chief of the Federation’, issued this Monday, the medical doctors voiced their worry over the deteriorating state of Nigeria’s health sector, adjudging that the system was “on the verge of collapse,” TheCable reports.
In the correspondence, endorsed by NARD President Mohammad Suleiman, the body called on President Tinubu to address their long-standing demands, among them payment of salary arrears, implementation of the consolidated medical salary structure (CONMESS), and improved welfare for its members.
Part of letter read, “We are doctors — men and women devoted to saving lives, working long hours in often harsh and under-resourced conditions.
“Our appeal is simple and sincere: we seek not luxuries, but the basic salaries, allowances, and welfare packages that have already been approved and promised by government.”
The group complained that many of its members were yet to receive their entitlements despite several signed agreements and assurances from government, warning that the continued neglect of frontline medical workers “threatens the very foundation of the country’s healthcare delivery system”.
The doctors had gone on a five-day warning strike to press home their demands, which included an upward review of CONMESS, payment of the 2023 medical residency training fund (MRTF), and the recruitment of more clinical staff.
After the expiration of the unheeded ultimatum, NARD announced that it would commence an indefinite nationwide strike on November 1 over “the persistent neglect of its welfare and working conditions”.
The doctors pled with Tinubu to display his “fatherly leadership” in resolving the protracted issues, and thereby “restore hope, trust, and stability” to Nigeria’s healthcare system.
