The Medical and Dental Consultants Association of Nigeria (MDCAN) has said that it would oppose and resist any alleged plan by the Federal Government to sack members of the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) involved in the ongoing strike.
MDCAN said although the association is restrained by the National Industrial Court (NIC) not to participate in the strike, it would however resist the threat of proscription, mass sack or any conceived threat of force by the Federal Government.
In a release signed by Steve Oluwole, a medical doctor and MDCAN president, and made available to newsmen in Ibadan yesterday, the association also noted that the assumption that its members, who are currently restrained by a court order, will capitulate is erroneous but urged the federal government to employ diplomacy to resolve all the outstanding issues with the striking doctors.
“Any threat against the workers will only aggravate rather than assuage the crisis and the threat of proscription of NMA, which is not just undemocratic, but also ad nauseum, should be consigned to fiction,” the association stated.
“The attention of the MDCAN is drawn to the purported plan of the Federal Government to take drastic steps to end the current NMA strike. Unnamed government officials have leaked to the Press that the Government is considering proscription of the NMA.
“In the event that the Federal Government tows this course of action, the military will be deployed to guard the medical institutions with military and para-military medical professionals rendering services in the mean time.
“All public health institutions will be privatised. Then the ‘no work no pay’ principle will be enforced, doctors who are interested will be protected to resume duties while new ones will be employed to take their place.”
He alleged that the Minister of Health had granted an interview which indicated the plans of the federal government to proscribe Nigerian Medical Association.
According to Oluwole, before the NMA declared the strike, MDCAN implored government to look professionally, but not politically at all the issues regretting however that there is little evidence that such had been done.
The government appears not to have learned lessons from failed drastic measures of the 1970s that irreparably damaged the structure and psyche of public service and of universities in Nigeria.
Oluwole who said the ruling political elite are hell-bent on destroying the health system noted that “the annual medical bills alone, after retirement from office of political office holders, exceed 10 years take-home pay of medical consultants,” adding that Nigeria, however, “belongs to all citizens, but not to political office holders alone who now threaten the very fabric of the medical profession.
“In 1985, the President of the Federal Republic officially earned about five times the salary of a house officer. The salary of ministers had equivalents in the university and hospital systems.
“The salaries of political office holders today are largely unknown, have no equivalents in the civil service structure, but more strangely have no equivalents in the political structures of the United States and of European Countries.
“Nigerian public officers, who refer to themselves as political class, forget that the NMA participated in the struggle for the return of Nigeria to the democracy they have defaced, distorted, and redesigned for personal gain. The so described political class has become more equal than the rest in the Nigerian type of democracy.
“Allowances of some political office holders per month exceed years of total take-home of medical consultants. The sarcasm of agents of government that should they print money to satisfy doctors shows insensitivity.
“Concerned public officers, however, utilise public funds to maintain their private jets, purchase exotic cars, and keep countless mansions without the need to print money. They not only acquire whilst in office, but also acquire into the future.”
Remi Feyisipo
