Buhari urges doctors to shelve planned strike and promises to honour all agreements

PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari has appealed to members of the National Association of Resident Doctors (Nard) to shelve their planned strike and give the federal government more time to address their grievances promising to honour all existing agreements.

 

Nard, which represents doctors working in the nation's university teaching hospitals,  have threatened to go on strike over the non-payment of their allowances and the breaching of their agreement with the government. In a desperate bid to avert the strike, President Buhari held a meeting with the leadership of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) at the presidential villa in Abuja and appealed to Nard to reconsider its planned strike.

 

At the meeting, President Buhari gave the doctors an assurance that no agreements duly entered into by the federal government would not be honoured by his administration. He then called for greater understanding and support from doctors and all Nigerians in view of the present shortfall in national revenue, brought about by the decline of crude oil prices.

 

President Buhari's spokesman Mallam Shehu Garba, said: “Decrying the adverse impact of the fall in oil prices on the federal government’s spending plans for health and other sectors, President Buhari said that his administration would continue to do its best to address issues that were of concern to doctors and Nigerians. The president also gave the NMA delegation an insight into his administration’s plan to establish 10,000 primary healthcare centres across the country in the next two years, with the objective of providing better healthcare for about 100m Nigerians."

 

According to Mallam Garba, President Buhari also told the delegation, led by the NMA president Dr Kayode Obembe, that the National Health Act will soon be put in a gazette and a steering committee appointed to oversee its implementation. Health minister Professor Isaac Adewole,  described the plan to establish more healthcare centres as the single most ambitious health plan for the poor in the history of Nigeria.

 

Dr Obembe called for the implementation of the report of the Yayale Ahmed Committee on better relations among  professional groups in the health sector. He also called for the urgent implementation of the National Health Act.

 

At a separate meeting with the leadership of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria (PSN), President Buhari  promised that his administration would evolve and implement measures to curb friction and disharmony among the professional groups in the health sector. He urged the PSN to work more closely with the National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control to curb the sale of fake drugs in the country.