The Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) Kano State chapter has expressed shock over the news that the state government has employed over 100 doctors and nurses from Egypt to work in hospitals in the state.
In a statement signed by its chairman, Dr. Shehi Ali Abubakar, the association described the action as the highest form of insensitivity to the plight of doctors working under the government in particular and the condition of the health sector in general.
“While the government has been dragging its feet for the past two and a half years in meeting its contractual obligation to doctors salary under CONMESS, due to lack of funds, it suddenly has funds to employ foreign doctors,” he stated.
Dr. Abubakar expressed shock that a doctor in Kano with full knowledge of local diseases is of less value to the government and cannot be paid hundred per cent of his salary while an Egyptian doctor can be paid 6000 dollars monthly wages.
“We are now fully convinced that this government has no plan to tackle the issue of manpower shortage in the health sector and stop the current exodus of doctors from the state,” the statement said.
The association noted that the state government has failed to pay all the contract doctors under its employment the agreed 15 percent contract addition since its inception, although it is now ready to pay ten times that amount to Egyptian doctors.
It urged the government to rescind the decision for the sake of industrial harmony in the state health sector, and called on the medical and dental council to monitor the situation in view of many instances in the past where foreign health personnel who are not medically qualified have been employed to work as medical doctors.
