Union pleads with Tinubu to appoint experienced administrator as county’s next minister of health

The Nigerian Union of Allied Health Professionals has pleaded with President Bola Tinubu to think about appointing a seasoned administrator to serve as the country’s next minister of health.

The medical community objected to the practise of successive governments favouring medical officers and claimed that it must end because the doctors selected during the previous two decades were inadequate.

Dr. Obinna Ogbonna, president of NUAHP, made the call in an exclusive interview during the eighth national conference of health professionals in Abuja.

The dietician claimed that no minister appointed from the medical field had achieved success in the field of health, with the exception of renowned economist Prof. Eyitayo Lambo.

 

“We are expecting Mr. President to see how there is going to be a rearrangement of the Federal Ministry of Health since we are having challenges there,” he stated. The ministers we have had over the years have displayed incompetence in that they only consider their own areas of interest. The majority of the time, our objections are ignored, and all other healthcare professionals are marginalised. That was the catalyst for the strike we had two weeks ago.

“We anticipate an overhaul and re-engineering of that industry. Then place the appropriate group of people in charge of the affairs. Even more, we advocate that none of us who work as professionals should interact with administrations. There is nothing for us to do in terms of administration. Don’t appoint any medical professional as minister of health. Even whether we are dieticians, chemists or nurses, none of us should be doing it.

“Let’s have experienced, impartial administrators, like we had with Eyitayo Lambo when he was in charge. Do you recall Lambo being an economist? We were all pleased with him because he was objective and diligent in his work. I can even confirm that throughout President Olusegun Obasanjo’s government from 2003 to 2009, there weren’t many strikes. These are some of the indices that we anticipate. Synergy is necessary for all of us to function as a cohesive unit. Every employee in the health industry is crucial, he said.

The dietician, who is also an auditor for the Trade Union Congress, also addressed the recent spat over pay difference between doctors and JOHESU last week, saying it was an example of calling a dog a bad name in order to hang it.
Since 2014, the Consolidated Medical Salary Structure, which sets the salaries for medical and dental professionals, has been subject to adjustments at the request of JOHESU.

According to a letter from the Federal Ministry of Health dated April 3, 2023, in response to JOHESU’s request, there has been a relative wage disparity between CONMESS and CONHESS since 2014.

However, the Nigerian Medical Association criticised the decision, stating that changing CONHESS might trigger a catastrophic crisis in the healthcare industry.

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The NMA claimed that the health sector would suffer as a result of the CONHESS adjustment in a letter it sent to the permanent secretary on June 7, 2023.

The statement read, “NMA shall not sit idly by and permit anyone to degrade our remuneration by meddling with relativity, as this shall worsen medical brain drain with attendant bad implications on our frail health sector.”

But Ogbonna, who is also the National Vice Chairman of the Joint Health Sector Union, spoke in favour of other healthcare professionals, stating that doctors must learn to get along amicably with other healthcare professionals such as nurses, chemists, lab scientists, and others.

He also criticised the NMA, claiming that the doctors were mistaken to think that JOHESU wanted to have the same pay scale as them.

“That is false. Other healthcare experts cannot possibly demand the same compensation package. They merely aim to spread misinformation and deception among the uninformed populace. The entry points have already addressed relativity, as we know it. While we all know that doctors undergo a six-year training programme, other professionals like optometrists, physiotherapists, and chemists also undergo a six-year training programme. A house officer starts off on Grade Level 10 of the service ladder. He enters Grade Level 12 after completing his housemanship and service.

“Take, for instance, the revised CONMESS compensation scale that we are discussing. We started working on it in 2014. That has now been around nine and a half years. About three or four adjustments have been made to theirs. The fourth one was the one that dispersed everything. They’ll claim they don’t have any money and that doing so will skew relativity. This is untrue. The issue of relativity was resolved at the point of introduction into service.

“Let them keep screaming foul, please. Tinubu, a new sheriff, has just arrived in town. We met with the president and discussed this with him. He’s investigating it right now. The publication they made last week (on wage discrepancy) was even childish, and we responded to it, so we know it won’t be business as usual. We must let the general public know that discrimination against us in our own field and nation is wrong. It is against the International Labour Organization’s Convention. The fact that we study other science courses does not imply that we lack the ability to understand medicine. But everyone has the chance to be in God’s area of interest, he added.