No fewer than about 300 nurses under the aegis of National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives (NANNM) drawn from the 25 local government areas of Delta State on Tuesday morning besieged the premises of the Local Government Service Commission in Asaba to demand that executive secretaries be stopped from superintending over primary healthcare centres (PHCs) in the local government areas.
The protesters, armed with placards bearing different inscriptions, also demanded the reversal of certain actions and decisions taken by the state government with particular reference to the administration of PHCs in the state.
The angry nurses claimed that the actions and policies of government have rendered them irrelevant in the administration of PHCs, contrary to the demands of the nursing and medical profession.
Part of the inscriptions on their placards read; “Commissioner for health, What did we do to deserve this treatment? Review the appointment of executive secretaries, let the executive secretaries stop signing pay vouchers of PHC departments, They are staff of the state government, executive secretaries should stop oppressing nurses, our right has been taken away from us”.
Speaking to journalists during the protest, the secretary of the Nursing Association in Delta State, Mr Frank Okoh stated that all nurses in the state were currently suffering over the running of PHCs in the local government areas, adding that, “we have written several letters but nobody listening to us. If we remain like this, there will be crisis. We are being oppressed at different levels”.
Okoh maintained that nurses in the state were being relegated to the background as the executive secretaries in the council area have taken over the PHCs in the councils, alleging that the secretaries were being supported by some power brokers within the corridors of the state government.
The protesting nurses, while strongly condemning the casualization of nurses in the PHCs, said that it was against the rules of labour to casualize nurses and pay them N30,000 monthly.
They demanded the review of the duties of the office of the executive secretaries, relocation of the executive secretaries from local government secretariats, and that they should be stopped from harassing nurses.
But the state chairman, Local Government Service Commission (LGSC), Mr Olumami Oyibo, in a swift reaction, told journalists that the state government was looking into the protest of the nurses, assuring that the issues raised will be treated without bias, and that their message will be passed to the state governor, lfeanyi Okowa.
He said, “the Governor is prepared to look into all the issue raised by the nurses; the issue of executive secretaries will be looked into. An analysis will be made and appropriate recommendations will also be made and forwarded to the Governor for consideration and implementation”.
Also speaking, the state commissioner for Health, Dr Mordi Ononye reaffirmed the state government’s commitment to ensuring that nurses are given their due, adding that the protest was not necessary as they could have had dialogue with the government to forge a common way forward.
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