By Chernor Alimamy Kamara
The President of Sierra Leone Medical and Dental Association (SLMDA), Dr. Edries Tejan, has confirmed to Politico that they were ending their indefinite strike action, saying it was “in the interest of the masses”. The nationwide industrial action lasted for five days causing untold suffering to patients.
Dr Tejan said the Ministry of Health fulfilled about 80 percent of their previous agreement over better conditions of service and were now suspending their strike action.
Dr. Tejan said that their demand for the payment of their backlog salary deductions from May to August had been dropped and that the Ministry had agreed to reinstate the money that was deducted from their salary by way of a pay rise which would come into effect in September. He said the ministry had agreed to give them their fuel entitlement, but not in cash as they had wanted it. This they will now get in the form of a prepaid card as the cash payment was against government policy.
“The system that used to happen while we were not getting the fuel was abandoned, so we settled for a prepaid card system that we have been charged quarterly,” he said.
He said they only agreed on the quarterly card system because they noticed there was going to be a stalemate which they wanted to avoid.
He said that their resumption of work was a unanimous decision by their general membership and that it was now for the government to start paying them their deducted salaries in September. He said they had resumed work pending the honoring of that part of the agreement, or they would be left with no alternative but to lay down their tools again, indefinitely.
He said they had a cordial working relationship with the ministry of health and believed the strike action would not in any way jeopardize that.
“But when once we advocate for something, we are expecting the ministry to listen to our concerns and try to address those issues,’’ Dr. Tejan pointed out.
He claimed they had been engaged behind the scenes since February. “We decided to stage the strike because there was a breakdown in the negotiations and we were not seeing any headway to settle what the medical doctors are entitled to, and that’s why we even hosted a press conference to inform the general public of our position,” he said.
He said they had come up with a position paper that they hoped would address everything regarding the welfare of medical doctors in the country. “I hope we will settle for an agreement with the ministry so that what just happened will not repeat itself again,” he said.
Minister of Health, Dr. Austin Demby, in a social media post said they had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with SLMDA that also called for the health workers to return to their stations.
The action of the doctors and dentists affected many patients admitted and those in need of professional medical services in government hospitals.
The Sick Pikin Project International Sierra Leone in a press statement appealed to both the government and the doctors to reach an agreement over the issue, noting that the strike action was affecting children “with some in need of urgent surgeries. Critical to note that, funds have been raised to meet their surgery costs but cannot be undertaken now as a result of the ongoing strike action,” the statement reads.
Copyright © 2022 Politico Online
