GOVERNOR FASHOLA SACKS 1000 STRIKING LAGOS DOCTOR

Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola, on Monday ordered the sacking of striking doctors in its employ.

It was learnt that the doctors started receiving their letters of sacking on Monday morning.
Fashola’s action was in response to the refusal of the doctors to end their strike, which has lasted for over two weeks.

The doctors had initally embarked on a three-day warning strike last month and resumed work. But they proceeded on an indefinite strike on April 24 after they were summoned to face a disciplinary panel for participating in the three-day warning strike.

The demand of the doctors like in other states of the federation since September 2009 has always been for the Lagos State Government to fully implement the Consolidated Medical Salary Scale for all the doctors in the state.

CONMESS is the universal scale of remuneration for all doctors in Nigeria regardless of location or employer. It was put in place to curb brain drain and correct wage disparity.

However, the four-year labour battle between the state government and doctors in its employ took a new dimension on April 24 when all the doctors that participated in the three-day warning strike between April 11 and 13 faced the Personnel Management Committee constituted by the state government.

The Chairman of the Medical Guild, Dr. Olumuyiwa Odusote, alleged that the state government used police officers and armoured vehicles stationed at the Lagos General Hospital, venue of the sitting of the committee, to terrorise and demoralise doctors.

Also, the Chairman, Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria, Lagos State Chapter, Dr. Adebowale Adekoya, who spoke at the venue of the inquiry, had said it was a rude shock to discover that consultants and specialists had been summoned to face the panel with government threatening to sack any of them.

Adekoya said, “If they want to sack, then we say sack over 1,100 doctors that participated. An injury to one is an injury to all. Sack all of us. The doctors’ strike is not the first in Nigeria and none of those unions has been sacked. So we are waiting for Lagos State to make history. We are workers not slaves.

“How can consultants and even those in the emergency unit be asked to face panels when they are supposed to be attending to patients in critical conditions. All the time spent on issuing queries to all the doctors could have been spent negotiating with the guild to broker peace.

“The victimisation and terrorisation of our members who have participated in the strike must stop. We hear that some of us may be arrested at the panel but we want Lagosians to intervene with their leaders to prevent a war.”

SOURCE: Punch