The national body of the Nigerian Medical Association, on Friday, called on the Lagos State government to immediately reverse the sack of doctors.
Speaking in Lagos, the NMA national president, Osahon Enabulele, told the state government to also “withdraw the queries issued and open themselves up for sincere and genuine dialogue with the doctors.”
Enabulele blamed the state government for the ongoing crisis in the state’s health sector, saying that “nobody forced them to enter into an agreement reached with the doctors on March 24, 2011 to implement Consolidated Medical Salary Structure (CONMESS) in full.”
“They should honestly take responsibility for all that has happened because what has generated the crisis is their inability to keep faithfully to the agreement,” he said.
According to Enabulele, a meeting between the national executives of the doctors’ union and the state government, held on Thursday, over the state’s health crisis, ended in a deadlock.
He also blamed the deadlock on the state government’s “fixated and vexatious position” to discipline its doctors, adding that the State Head of Service, Adesegun Ogunlewe, insisted that the matter was beyond him.
The NMA president also criticised the ongoing forceful eviction of the sacked doctors from staff quarters.
“The eviction is totally rejected by the NMA; it is not in order and it even violates the Tenancy Law,” he said.
In his reaction, the chairman of the Medical Guild, the umbrella body of the sacked doctors, Olumuyiwa Odusote, said the eviction, which started on Wednesday, was enforced by armed police officers.
He said, “The power to forcefully evict tenants resides with the court.”
Enabulele, however, directed the Lagos chapter of the NMA to explore all options it deems fit, including strike action following the break down in negotiation with the state government.
With this development, doctors in federal hospitals in Lagos could soon go on a solidarity strike in support of their colleagues sacked by the state government.
As regards the Hippocratic oath taken by members of the medical profession, which gives priority to the “health and life of patients”, Enabulele described its application as relative.
He said that the oath is only applicable when doctors are provided the “enabling environment to work.”
“That’s not what we have in Nigeria. When governments have problem with keeping agreements, the easier thing to recall is the Hippocratic oath,” he said.
In a swift reaction to the doctors, the State Commissioner for Justice, Ade Ipaye, told journalists that the eviction was in order.
Ipaye said that the rules guiding civil servants in the state legalises the immediate and forced eviction of the sacked doctors from the staff quarters.
“There are rules and regulation guiding their employment which talks on what should happen when they are dismissed from work,” he said.
Similarly, the Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Aderemi Ibirogba, added that the state government had not broken any law “since the doctors were no more in the employ of the state government.”
Ibirogba said the doctors were only given the homes based on their status as in the medical profession.
“The quarters were given to them as part of their conditions of service. Now they have been dismissed because they did not want to work after persuasion, should they continue to enjoy the privilege?” he asked.
Meanwhile, the doctors have gone to court to challenge their dismissal from service, but Ibirogba insisted that the state government was yet to get a court order restraining its action.
“For now, the dismissal and eviction stay,” he said. “They should just do the right thing and vacate the quarters because by staying there they are committing another illegality.”
About 800 doctors were sacked for their failure to respond to queries issued to them to explain their absence from work due to an earlier strike.
