Minority pleads with doctors to resume work

The Minority in Parliament has passionately appealed to striking doctors to accept, at least for now, whatever deal government reaches with them and return to work as soon as practicable.

According to the caucus, it is important to remind the doctors that notwithstanding the weight of their grievances, their strike action is resulting in deaths that could otherwise be prevented.

“There are cases of working people who now suffer from various ailments which could have been redressed but who are otherwise excusing themselves from work. Productivity for the individual and nation is being negatively affected. There are people who are sick today and who for lack of medicare in these crisis moment may become permanently disabled. In this stand-off, it is the very poor in society who are bearing the brunt of the action of the doctors’ strike. If and when a solution is found to the impasse, and we sincerely hope it will be soonest, the situations recounted cannot be reversed”.

Public sector doctors have been on strike for about a month demanding better conditions of service, the absence of which they have vowed not to return to the consulting rooms.

But the National Labour Commission (NLC) has asked the Ghana Medical Association (GMA) and government to recommence negotiations on the conditions of service for the doctors immediately.

A statement from the NLC, signed by its Acting Executive Secretary, Dr Bernice Welbeck, directed both parties to report to the commission on Monday, August, 24, 2015.

At a press briefing in Accra, the Minority Ranking Member on the Parliamentary Committee on Health, Dr Richard Anane, charged government to, as a matter of urgency, take steps to win back the confidence of GMA so that both parties can relax and come to the negotiation table and settle the impasse amicably.

He added that government must as a matter of urgency give GMA some level of assurance by meeting them some way on the list of request so that they can resume work immediately to save lives while negotiations continue.

“Perhaps Ghanaians must be told how many people have perished thus far while this hiatus lasts. Last week in Kenya, where Doctors and Nurses embarked on strike for 5 days, 11 people died as a direct result of the strike action and that was enough for the public to get the government to sit down to negotiate with the medics and paramedics. In Ghana, it is government’s attack dogs that are unleashed on the striking doctors”.