Sack Mrs. Ruby Adom Panu As Principal Of Bolgatanga Midwifery

Sack Mrs. Ruby Adom Panu As Principal Of Bolgatanga Midwifery—Upper East Youth Association

Members of the Upper East Youth association have called on the Minister of Health, Hon. Joseph Yelechire, to sack the principal of the Bolgatanga midwifery training school for undermining initiatives by district hospitals to recruit adequate numbers of midwives to provide quality maternal and child health care services.

In a statement released on Tuesday, October 11, 2011, the group said it has been saddened and appalled by certain negative, unprofessional developments at the Bolgatanga Midwifery Training School and calls in support of members of the Northern Patriots in Research and Advocacy (NORPRA) for the immediate removal of Mrs. Adom Ruby from office as the principal.

We are therefore by this release demanding on the Minister of Health to immediately sack Mrs. Adom without further delay and before anything untoward happens.

The youth association has always worked hard and fearless in support of heads of institutions and departments, groups and individuals who exhibit good leadership, innovativeness, creativity and deep commitment to duty for the betterment of life and conditions for the people of the Upper East Region and for that matter, mother Ghana.

We therefore take strong exception to Mrs. Ruby Adom’s unprofessional, uncooperative and arrogant posturing and her penchant for undermining anything innovative by her colleagues and even her superiors.

The peculiar situation of Northern Ghana and its general underdevelopment requires of people in position to think out of the box and ensure efficiency in the utilization of resources.

It is in this regard, that we lauded the initiative of the Medical Superintendent of the Gushegu District Hospital, Dr. Azaare Nsoh, to use part of the hospital’s internally generated funds to sponsor two community health and three enrolled nurses to pursue midwifery training to replace the only three midwives currently at post at the hospital.

For Mrs. Adom to fight tooth and nail to scupper such an initiative is not only wicked and vicious, but smacks of an unacceptable unprofessional behaviour unbefitting her position as a leader of such an important institution.

The facts of the matter are that the Medical Superintendent of the Gushegu District Hospital, faced with a dire situation of acute shortage of mid wives, made a plea to the Northern Regional Director of Health Services for a special consideration for admission of five nurses of the hospital for midwifery training to support and replace three midwives currently at post at the Hospital, two of whom are on the verge of retirement.

The Northern Regional Health Director in empathizing with the situation wrote to the Minister of Health, forwarding the special request for consideration.

The letter from the Northern Regional Health Director, dated 19th May, 2011 and captioned, “RECOMMENDATION FOR SPECIAL CONSIDERATION FOR ADMISSION” stated that “one of the major challenges facing this region is the acute shortage of Midwives, and most of the few that we have too are advanced in age” and that “Even though the situation is (generally) lousy that of the Gushegu District is very critical.”

The letter stated that “a whole district hospital like Gushegu with all the ultra-modern facilities has only three midwives at post” and that as a result of the dire situation, management was encouraging the five nurses to pursue post basic midwifery training in order to fill the gap.

The Regional Director also indicated in his letter for SPECIAL CONSIDERATION, a preparedness of the hospital to sponsor the students when admitted.

When the Minister received the letter, he wrote a request, dated 20th June, 2011, titled “REQUEST FOR SPECIAL CONSIDERATION FOR ADMISSION FOR POST BASIC MIDWIFERY COURSE” to the Principal of the Bolgatanga Midwifery Training School, acknowledging the special case and initiative of the Gushegu Medical Superintendent and recommending the five nurses for admission to “help reduce maternal and child death.”.

The request also had the blessing of the Regional Director of Health Services, Upper East Region who wrote indicating his “full support” for the initiative and pleaded with the Mrs. Adom, the Principal to “kindly assist.”

Based on the pleas and reasonability of the requests coming from all quarters, including the Ministry of Health, the health policy making and executive body, Mrs. Adom succumbed and offered admissions to all the five nurses on August 11, 2011 and making the Gushgegu District Hospital pay GHC 5,422.02 as admission fees among others.

Then without any further communications or notifications to anybody, not the Regional Directors of Ghana Health Services, Upper east and Northern regions, not the medical superintendent of the Gushegu district Hospital and not even to the Minister of Health, Mrs. Adom, in her usual unilateral and ‘thin God’ attitude and character, issued a verbal fiat, dismissing the five nurses and asking them to come for a refund of their fees.

To further her agenda, she attempted incriminating the nurses by demanding that they wrote, withdrawing themselves from the school.

Several efforts by the Regional Director, Ghana Health Services of the Upper East Region, the Northern Region and the Medical Superintendent of the Gushegu District Hospital among others to get Mrs. Adom to see reason with the “Special request” fell on deaf ears. The school has become her own and it is only her who decides the faith of women and children, nobody else.

The Upper East Youth Association has been terribly hurt by Mrs. Adom’s behaviour.

We can not see how she can continue as head and leader of the school and successfully steer the professional training of midwives to serve the health interest of the region and Ghana as a whole with this arrogance, ill-feeling, disrespectful and thin-God attitude.

Mrs. Adom has been the principal of the school for over twelve years and her long stay at the school makes her feels and behaves untouchable.

Mrs. Adom has demonstrated her lack of compassion for the people of Upper East and Northern Ghana as a whole by undermining initiatives that seek to address the peculiar situation of underdevelopment of the north.

Mrs. Adom has over the years exhibited doubtful competence on matters of administration and governance for such an important and highly regarded institution of professional training.

Mrs. Adom sees her post as only good for frequent travels and reckless spending

Mrs. Adom lacks compassion and cannot lead the training of personnel who are to exhibit a high sense of compassion in their professional duties.

We draw Mrs. Adom’s attention that the only sufficient condition that can necessitate the termination of the offer of admission to a student is misconduct, unsatisfactory progress in studies or failing to pass any prescribed examination. This was not the case with the five nurses and that her decision to sack them only demonstrates how unacceptably arbitrarily and arrogant she is.

The Upper East Youth Association therefore demands on the Minister of Health, Hon. Joseph Yielechire:

To as a matter of urgency, remove Mrs. Adom as principal of the Bolgatanga Training school within the next 48 hours.

To instruct that the five nurses be allowed to continue with their training unhindered.

To set up a Special Committee to examine the nursing and doctor situation of the three Northern Regions and map out a strategy for equitable and quality health care delivery in the regions

We also request on the Honorable Minister to send a word of commendation to the Medical Director of the Gushegu District Hospital for his hard work, leadership and commitment to resolving the pathetic maternal and child health.

Long live the youth of the upper East Region!

Long live all compassionate, committed, hardworking and visionary leaders of the Upper East Region

Long live Mother Ghana!

Signed:

1. Jonathan Adabre 020 3023 178, adabre2000@yahoo.com

2. Mike Zuri, 020 7519606, zurimike@yahoo.com

3. Pastor Isaac Yen 0246281844

4. Adingo Francis 0268355841

5. Azobre Imoro Atare 0209779096

6. Ayorogo Bismark, 0209313630

7. SIMMS, 0208238888

8. Evans Dinko, 0202527080

9. Modesta Asolemna 0200330421

10. Cynthia Bawah 0249246400

11. Pastor Moses 0541595668

12. Agana B. Rashid 0208075439

13. Alaskoma Asakeya Noble 0248977818

14. Abopaam Akamiri Stanley 0208520770