Maravi

We’re ready to be fired - C/belt health workers

We’re ready to be fired - C/belt health workers
Written by Staff Reporters
Saturday, June 27, 2009 3:45:35 PM

ZAMBIA Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) president Leonard Hikaumba has said issuing threats against the striking health workers will not solve any problem.
And police officers were yesterday deployed to various clinics in Lusaka as the strike by health workers continued.

Meanwhile, health workers on the Copperbelt have declared that they are ready to be fired as they will not resume work if their demands are not met.

Commenting on health minister Kapembwa Simbao's order to striking health workers to resume work by Monday failure to which they would be sacked, Hikaumba said intimidation of health workers would equally not work.

Hikaumba said the health workers could not be fired if there was no suitable and adequate replacement.

"If the nurses decide not to reapply, where do you get the manpower? They are banking on retired nurses, they are not even enough to cover the whole country because you are firing people doing field work. Where can you just fire people and get a replacement immediately without problems?" Hikaumba asked.

He said as a union, they had been persuading health workers not to leave the country looking at how marketable their profession was.

"We encourage them to work within the country. If you look at other countries and compare the conditions of service, there is a big temptation to work outside the country so as a union, we are talking to our members. Let us motivate our own people, if all our health workers went out of the country, what will happen to the majority of Zambians?" he asked.

Hikaumba said the health workers' grievances were valid and legitimate because they had been complaining about allowances that had not been reviewed for the past six years.

He said the matter needed to be resolved amicably and that whatever action would be taken should be aimed at finding a solution to the problem.

"Comments made should be aimed at finding a solution. If they are going to say things that will aggravate the situation, it is not good for us. Let us be very conscious so that we handle the situation very strategically. The language from government should be persuasive rather than intimidation and use of threats," he said.

Hikaumba said health workers were human beings who were capable of listening.

And police officers were deployed to Bauleni, Kalingalinga and Matero referral clinics following the statement by Simbao.

A check at the University Teaching Hospital (UTH) found the nurses gathered near the car park at the casualty ward.

One of the nurses spoken to said as far as they were concerned, the government had not communicated anything to them.

The nurse said health workers had a number of meetings with the government and they did not expect to be addressed through the media.

"As far as we are concerned, that was just a national address," the nurse said.

Another nurse said they would continue going to the hospital because a nurse belonged to a hospital just as a teacher belonged to a class.

The nurse said the government should not create enmity between the nurses and the police by using the latter to intimidate them.

The nurse said they were still waiting for feedback from their union leader and labour minister Austin Liato as promised after the meeting on Monday.

"If they want to fire us, let them give us our packages instantly. We are better off working for a white man and we will not return to work unless we are met half-way and do not be cheated, there is no one who is working. If they decide to fire all of us, they will have to close all the clinics as well," the nurse said. "If they do not have money to pay as they claim, where are they going to get money to pay expatriates? We know what we want. Why is it so difficult to sign the agreement we want, to commit themselves? Why is Simbao so quick to issue threats when no single day did he come to address us? He is contradicting himself because Liato said he would get back to us as soon as possible so we are waiting for him, at least he made an effort to come and see us. Let him [Simbao] leave this to Liato. He wasn't interested as a father to come and address us and left it to our uncle [Liato]."

And police in riot gear sealed off Ndola Central and Kitwe Central hospitals, blocking health workers from holding their meetings at the premises.

During a meeting held at Kansenshi Cemetery in Ndola after they were blocked from holding their meeting at Ndola Central Hospital, the health workers said they were ready to be buried and would not report for work as demanded by Simbao.

Civil Servants and Allied Workers Union of Zambia (CSAWUZ) Ndola district branch chairperson Joy Beene asked the workers if they were ready to be fired to which they answered in the affirmative.

"Firing should not be without money," Beene said. "They should give us dismissal letters with our packages."

Beene said the health workers had forwarded their demands to Liato and expected him to return with answers to them.

"Liato promised us 'let me go and consult' and that consultation was just a phone call consultation and we all remained there in the cafeteria with the provincial health director, Ndola Central Hospital director but he went for good," Beene said. "It was the minister of labour who opened the meeting and I am just sitting in for him. I can't close the meeting for him he just has to come and close it."

He noted that Liato was on record as having indicated that President Banda did not say that health workers would be fired.

"What Simbao said [on firing health workers], he did not liaise with the labour minister," he said. "He was supposed to get instructions from the labour minister."

Beene urged workers who would receive letters of dismissal or disciplinary action not to be intimidated.

One of the health workers challenged Simbao not to address them on television but to get to the ground and face them.

Another health worker remarked that they only watched Al Jazeera and not ZNBC television and as such Simbao's message would not reach them.

Another health worker, who said she served during Dr Kenneth Kaunda's era when the health workers strike went on for 40 days, testified that at the time, doctors were evicted from their houses and that should a similar thing happen, the health workers who would be removed from their houses could seek refuge from their colleagues who were ready to accommodate them.

Another health worker said government officials were contradicting themselves.

"They should be organised," she said. "Liato said they won't dismiss us and then Simbao says you'll be dismissed. Let them behave like adults and be organised."

Another worker reminded fellow health workers that the government was making frantic efforts in trying to ensure that they returned to work in view of the forthcoming Zambia International Trade Fair (ZITF).

The worker said the government did not want to be embarrassed before international visitors at the ZITF that the health system had ground to a halt in case anyone sought medical attention during the annual event.

The health worker said Simbao did not seem to understand how the health ministry operated.

The worker said those who had left Zambia for greener pastures in South Africa and other places would not return to take up vacancies that will have been created as a result of poor working conditions in the health sector.

The health worker told colleagues not to be tempted by allowances that would be given during the child health week planned for next week.

He encouraged his colleagues not to change their minds because if some went back to work then the government would have a reason to dismiss those who did not return.

One of the health workers accused the government of turning to the former health workers whom it had retired without paying benefits.

"Health workers were retired five years ago and they have not been given their packages," said the health worker. "They have been reduced to beggars and now they are asking them to re-apply. We won't be reduced to beggars."

The health workers resolved to meet at Kansenshi Cemetery on Monday at 08:00 hours.

And the health workers in Ndola who initially were supposed to meet at the Ndola Central Hospital were dispersed by police led by Ndola district deputy commanding officer Anderson Chengo.

In Kitwe riot police sealed off the Kitwe Central Hospital entrance.

In Luanshya, health workers refused to return to work, saying they would only do so when their demands are met.

Health workers in Luanshya said threats would not help the government.

Luanshya district commissioner George Kapu went to Roan General Hospital where health workers were meeting and went into another meeting with management and district union officials.

Health Workers Union of Zambia vice-chairman Innocent Daka said when union leaders went to speak to the workers after meeting Kapu, they refused to return to work and resolved to meet at Thomson Hospital on Monday.

The workers said they would meet at the graveyard if it so happened that they were chased away by police from the hospital premises.

Meanwhile, police in Chingola arrested four health workers union officials for gathering illegally in the hospital premises.

According to Patrick Chisanga, a member of the health workers' union, the officials wanted to brief their colleagues at Nchanga North Hospital on what transpired during their meeting with Liato in Ndola.

Chisanga said the police picked up the four leaders - Musonda Mabenga, Divan Kamuka and Shaderick Makopo - and took them to Chingola Central Police Station.

By press time the four were not charged but Chisanga said their arrest was pure intimidation by police.

Labels: COPPERBELT PROVINCE, KAPEMBWA SIMBAO, LEONARD HIKAUMBA, ZCTU

posted by MrK @ 2:46 PM