Nigeria Medical Workers
Strike: Let Us All Die!
By FEJIRO OLIVER
Silence never won rights. They are not handed
down from above; they are forced by pressure
from below---Roger Baldwin
I have tried very hard to restrain myself from
writing on this tragic strike embarked on by
the medical and health workers union in
Nigeria, but I can no longer hold myself from
writing this short piece, not after what one of
the health practitioners ( who prefers to be
called doctors ) said in a gathering of
intellectuals, that it is the prerogative of
Nigerian Medical Association(NMA) members to
be appointed as commissioners or ministers of
health. Then I knew that he and his colleagues
need to have their heads examined. My
assertion was later justified when I learnt that
he is a psychiatrist specialist who haven
mingled with mad men for years have lost his
sense of reasoning. Call it pride or being
boastful, but I can humbly say that I have
travelled and interacted with men of various
professions including foreign health workers
who are renowned surgeons, experts who at
their magical touch, celebral palsy is gone, but
I am yet to come across any who is as
pompous as Nigerian graduates of medicine.
Let no one say I have been paid for putting up
this reports or that I'm one of the other health
practitioners; far from it. As I matter of fact, I
am married to a member of this arrogant
profession. I have two female cousins who are
surgeons and graduates of Harvard, not these
mushroom universities that the so called
medical 'doctors' in Nigeria attended, yet go
about with shoulders highly lifted. So you see,
when I write with this amount of hurting truth,
I'm directly talking to my families. So let it be.
I have always been an advocate that the term
'doctor' be reserved for the academics that go
the extra mile to obtain the highest
educational degree, not a bunch of
opportunists who dumped the appellation of
physician for a more worthy title. For all the
years that I have read my bible, Christ or any
of the leaders there always addressed health
workers as physicians while he refers to the
highly educated ones as 'doctors of law'. What
then is this craze by these general body
physicians that they control the health sector?
What gave the NMA president, Mr. Osahon
Enabulele the impetus to tell his colleagues to
stand by even as the other medical workers go
striking? My visit to a hospital today in Lagos
made a mess of 'General' Osahon order who
feel that they can do the work they are not
trained for. Various calls made to my
colleagues in other states to confirm the state
of the hospitals where they reside confirm that
the entire hospital has been grounded.
I have never had a cause to be treated by any
of the general body physician in my life and
will never be, but I have had reasons to see a
medical laboratory scientist; yes, I have lost
count of reasons where nurses who do all the
dirty jobs have attended to me. I have seen a
family friend died when a physician who
cannot carry out a test asked him to go out of
the hospital gate to do a test before treatment
could be carried out, but died on the way,
holding the test result. I have visited a hospital
where a physician was truthful enough to tell a
stroke patient that they are not trained to
handle such cases, telling him bluntly that his
hope of walking lie with a doctor of
physiotherapy (DPT). I am reliably informed by
one of the NMA executive that the only
medical profession that they don't have the
faintest idea of how they work is the DPT, and
yet one still ask, why the discrepancy among
them.
It is only in Nigeria that a common appointed
minister is above the court of law. If it were
not so, who is Mr. Onyebuchi Chukwu to
disobey a court order, asking him to effect all
the demands of NUMPTAM/JOHESU. Let the
truth be told, their demand is just, fair and
worthy. Why must other government workers
skip grade level 11 and the minister gives
autocratic orders that all other medical
workers apart from physicians must not skip
it? What manner of working practice is it that
clinical specialist are not paid specialist
allowance, when NMA members enjoy such?
What outdated manner of man is the minister
of health to give a directive that Chief Medical
Directors of hospitals should be only from
NMA, when DPT, Optometry and pharmacists
are leading players in the field of medicine?
While I do not make claims for the medical
practitioners, I advocate for their rights been
given to them. That only NMA members should
be appointed as CMDs leaving other medical
professions out amounts to saying only
graduates of Banking/Finance should head the
Central Bank of Nigeria, when there are
graduates of accountancy and economics in the
profession, or succinctly put; that only
graduates of political science should hold
political positions when they have partners in
graduates of government and public
administration. The position of a CMD is
equivalent to chief executive officer and
should be filled by any qualified medical
practitioners, ditto commissioners and
ministers of health.
For a minister to flagrantly disobey a court
order and gets away with it is another dent of
the President Goodluck Jonathan
administration. It goes to show that Mr.
Jonathan day as a vice president were simply
wasted years, since he could not learn the
'rule of law' from President Musa Yaradua,
which was the bench mark of that
administration. For Christ sake, what manner
of ministers do we have? Let someone tell
Onyebuchi that we don't have a minister of
NMA but health. Can Mr. Jonathan be bold
enough to sack this man who the medical
workers have recommended his sack since last
year? Can this man resign his position as a
minister to allow a true health expert take
over? With this medical strike and ASUU strike,
a serious president would have asked both
ministers to submit their resignation letters,
but not Nigeria president. This is the price a
leader pay when he leaves experts and
technocrats to appoint political thieves in
office.
It is time Nigerians call the bluff off these
physicians once and for all the way Governor
Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State did last year.
It is time Nigerians tell them that they are like
the gatemen in the various government
ministries and should not use their pride to
cause innocent Nigerians to die in the hospitals
with no medical officer to attend to them. I
feel their pains as they lie down in their
various wards, praying for the strike to be
called off. I have been in their shoes losing
loved ones not because there are no
physicians, but there was no medical lab
scientist to carry out a test. I have been to the
physiotherapist department in various Nigerian
hospitals and see people wriggling in pains,
mothers crying to have their husbands treated
of strokes, children treated of ebbs palsy,
facial nerve and numerous medical conditions,
yet there was no hope as the DPTs are on
strike. I have known an operation successfully
carried out, but because of the absence of a
nurse to take care of the patient; we lost him.
This is the pain I feel. Pains that the medical
workers don't feel, as they forget the
Hippocratic Oath the very minute they leave
the medical college.
The minister of health is not fit for such a
sensitive position and while his cronies in NMA
who his presence is shielding will not agree to
his sack, let the ears of the president listen to
his medical colleagues who know his ineptitude
and have called for his removal. It is not too
late to bring back Mrs. Dora Akunyili who I
reliably gathered was penciled as health
minister, during the Olusegun Obasanjo
regime, before the NMA politics went through
the back door to stop it. If this strike will
claim the lives of all Nigerians before the
minister of health will be removed; so be it. An
African proverb says, 'Until you lose a loved
one before you realize that other dead bodies
are not sticks'
To you striking medical practitioners; today I
say to you: remember you are fighting more
than your own fight, you are fighting for the
future of your profession and you must stand
together. Break your chains and demand your
rights, for united you bargain but divided you
beg. If there is no struggle, progress is
stagnated.
May the blood of all the patients that may die
as a result of this strike, rest on Mr. Onyebuchi
Chukwu and his generations, now and forever
more; amen.
These little things matter
Fejiro Oliver, a Journalist can be reached on
secretsreporters@gmail.com and
+2348026797588 (sms only please)
Disclaimer: "The views expressed in this
article are the sole responsibility of the
author and do not necessarily reflect those
of The Nigerian Voice. The contents of this
article are of sole responsibility of the
author(s). The Nigerian Voice will not be
responsible or liable for any inaccurate or
incorrect statements contained in this
article." © FEJIRO OLIVER .

Lets get this straight:
You claim not to be a member of the allied medical proffession but how did u come about all this half baked facts?
You appear to regard the title Doctor with so much disdain, if its true you have them as spouse or cousins I am pretty sure u will know they went through fire before achieving such status.
If this title is so unimportant, how come we now have doctors of pharmacists, doctors of med lab tech, doctor of optometry in Nigeria, contrary to world best practices and all in an attempt to confuse the unsuspecting public.
Never heard of doctors skipping any grade level- feel free to prove me wrong.
Why do nurses, medical laboratory technicians and other support staff want to be consultants and CMDs when it is proven that doctors are the most versatile, they are trained in almost all aspects of medicine and hospital management!
Bet most of these people have never smelt the interior of the theatre or mortuary.
Trust me Doctors know where the shoe pinches most.
Finally the forefathers of most of this allied proffessional were trained by doctors.
Wait a minute, must you always aspire to be like them-think its better to obtain jamb form.
Op, clarify all these from your sponsors. Hmnn
I smell envy!

. Wat a joke. Chaii wicked Nigerian doctors, and here I was thinking cerebral palsy was a permanent disorder of motor function secondary to non progressive lesions to the brain. Thank u for saving me from my ignorance. Niccur u ain't married to no doctor. And the part about drs being gatemen was freaking hilarious, a real master piece, it really added to the seriousness of the whole write up. Abeg doctors don't do any work, all they do is kill patients. the orderlies, the gatemen, the nurses , lab scientist, etc are the real hard workers and life savers, they are the ones who didn't go to mushroom universities, they all went to havard, they should be running the health sector not those useless prima donnas. At this rate u may pop a vessel in ur brain.