Health workers begin 5-day warning strike

Health workers in Kaduna State have embarked on a five-day warning strike.

A check by the newsmen in some of the public hospitals showed only doctors and laboratory technicians were on duty.

Also, some of the patients had since been discharged from the hospitals as the nurses were on strike and there was no one to take care of them.

Speaking in an interview on Monday in Kaduna, Chairman of the National Association of Nurses and Midwives in the state, Mr. Ishaku Yakubu, said the strike was to press home some demands.

He said there were demands given to the state government over the years that were yet to be met.

Yakubu said, “The health workers embarked on the strike over issues that are yet to be resolved between them and the state government.

”The health workers have been on the CONHESS salary structure since 2009.

“We have the 2012 and 2013 versions that need to be reviewed by the state government, but up until now, they have done nothing about it.”

He said that since 2015, the state government had promised that they would increase the salary, saying, ”But up until now, nothing has been done.

“We have been working on these for the government to do something, but they approved the doctors and gave them 100 percent, while we nurses are yet to receive anything from them.”

Yakubu also said that the state government had yet to approve the 2003 hazard allowance approved by the federal government.

When contacted, the Permanent Secretary of the State Ministry for Health, Dr. Aishatu Mohamed-Saqid, said that she would officially react to the development on Tuesday.