Enugu Assembly to investigate strike by doctors in ESUTH

The Enugu State Assembly says it will investigate the reason behind the ongoing strike by resident doctors in Enugu State University Teaching Hospital (ESUTH), Parklane.
The Chairman of the Assembly Committee on Health, Mr Sam Ngene, said this on Thursday in Enugu during an oversight function of the committee in the hospital.
Ngene said that the committee considered the ongoing action by the medical doctors as ‘insensitive and inconsiderate’ on the part of the health professionals.
“Let the general public know that these people are doing this for no just reason. It is either they are doing it for money or somebody is propelling them.
“But we are going to dig deep into that. It is not when the government starts their own now people will start to bring in sentiment,” he said.
On the agitation of enhanced salary by the doctors, Ngene said that the state government had already set up a committee to look into the salary structure of all the health workers in the state.
He, therefore, described the action of the doctors as an embarrassment, considering the current global health emergency occasioned by the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Ngene said that it was more baffling that the resident doctors embarked on the strike even after receiving their April salary, including the 25 per cent COVID-19 allowance.
“They are a professional organisation and I give them that respect, but at this point they are not showing that core value of saving and protecting lives. The need to be compassionate” he said.
The committee chairman said that the lawmakers were in the hospital to inspect facilities and see the situation of the hospital.
He assured residents of the state and health seekers not to panic as the government was on top of the situation.
Some members of the committee inspected one of the COVID-19 Treatment and Isolation Centres in the state.
It would be recalled that the resident doctors in the hospital had on April 25 started an industrial action even after the state government had obtained an injunction from the National Industrial Court, restraining them.