Government has threatened to take action against striking doctors.
In a press statement issued on the Ministry of Health and Childcare’s official Twitter account, Government said doctors are not allowed to engage in a strike because they provide an esential service as defined by the Labour (Declaration of Essential Services) Notice, 2003 (SI 137 of 2003), section 2(e). Government said doctors who continue striking will face legal consequences. The statement reads:
Press Statement by the Health Service Board on withdrawal of services by some members of the Zimbabwe Health Service. In terms of the Labour (Declaration of Essential Services) Notice, 2003 (SI 137 of 2003), section 2(e), health services are declared an essential service. An essential service is any service the interruption of which endangers immediately the life, personal safety or health of the whole or any part of the public, in terms of section 102(a) of the Labour Act. In terms of section 104(3)(i) a of the same Act, no collective job action may be engaged in by a person in an essential service. Any breach of these provisions has legal consequences.
To this effect all members of the Health Service who have withdrawn their services are advised to report for duty with immediate effect, failure to this, the provisions of the Health Service Regulations, will be invoked.
The Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association (ZHDA) petitioned Government on February 5 this year and gave it 21 days to address a number of grievances that include the issue of allowances, vehicles and shortage of medicines and equipment in hospitals. Part of the letter reads:
This serves as a notice that with effect from March 1 we will be unable to discharge our normal duties until such a time the ministry decides to prioritise our people’s health. Our locums remain unpaid since October 2017 and we remain severely understaffed. There are no essential drugs and fluids and patients are dying unnecessarily. There has been no written response from you to address this and no tangible efforts. Working hours remain ill-defined and at the whim of the admin and our allowances have not been graded as per regional standards, a concern we raised in our letter dated February 5.
Government has however declared the strike illegal citing that it has addressed some of the issues raised by the doctors among them locum payments, motor vehicle scheme, availability of equipment and medicines at hospitals and freeze of vacant positions.
The voice of pple is the voice of God ,Listen to doctors
Your logic is upside-down—if the voice of the people is the voice of God, then doctors should attend to the people!
so if the doctors refuse to heed the threats by government it’s the poor masses who will suffer!
wonder why government always resort to threats rather than engage ţhe aggrieved part?
Zanu’s way of doing things always has detrimental consequences on the poor masses.