The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Kayode Obembe

  • EBOLA: FG, NMA agree on schools’ resumption date

    The Federal Government and the Nigerian Medical Association on Monday finally harmonized positions on the September 22 resumption of schools nationwide.

    The NMA said the September 22 date earlier announced by the federal government for the resumption of schools was acceptable and that schools should resume “in order not to feed into the fear monster in the country.”

    The association while agreeing with the government’s position at a stakeholders’ meeting with the House of Representatives Committee on Education however gave six provisions to be followed to keep the country safe.

    The President of the NMA, Dr. Kayode Obembe, said the association changed its mind on the condition that the government would, among other conditions, maintain “highest level of vigilance” in the several entry points in the country, resuscitate infectious disease hospital in states and ensure comprehensive screening of travelers.

    NMA said the international Port Health Services should be put in the highest level of vigilance and preparedness to screen those coming into the country.

    “All recent travelers to all the provinces of the current endemic countries of the Ebola disease – namely Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Sudan and Gabon-must be carefully scrutinized for the presence of the virus and epidemiologically treated accordingly,” NMA added.

     

  • Mark, Uduaghan, Ogbeha meet NMA over strike

    Mark, Uduaghan, Ogbeha meet NMA over strike

    Senate President David Mark has again held a closed door meeting with the leadership of the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) over the ongoing doctors’ strike.

    The meeting took place at the Apo residence of the Senate President, in Abuja, from Tuesday night till Wednesday morning.

    Governor of Delta State, Emmanuel Uduaghan, Senator Tunde Ogbeha and Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Affairs, Dr. Doyin Okupe, reportedly attended the meeting.

    The parley was in continuation of efforts by Mark to ensure that the current impasse between the striking doctors and the Federal Government is resolved.

    The Chief Press Secretary to the Senate President, Paul Mumeh, in a statement, said the NMA was set to end the industrial action embarked upon following disagreement with the federal government over unpaid allowances.

    The statement said that Mark reminded the doctors of the implications of the strike on the health of the citizens during the meeting.

    It noted that there were indications that government has complied with a reasonable number of the doctors’demands following which they resolved to brief their members before agreeing to call off the strike.

    The statement quoted the President of the NMA, Dr. Kayode Obembe, as saying that he would not give the exact date and time when the strike would be called off until he reports back to his members since “the meeting with the Senate President was very useful and successful.”

    On assumptions that the striking doctors abandoned the nation in this period of major heath challenge, Obembe said “there was never a time we refused to respond to the national emergency. We have been alive to our duties as professionals and to our father land.”

     

  • Doctors’ sack is illegal – NMA

    Nigeria Medical Association has expressed its disappointment at the sack of resident doctors by the Federal Government.

    The body on Friday directed its members not to collect any sack letter, saying the action is illegal because it did not follow status book.

    It also directed its members to shun any local appointment with the government hospitals as directed by the circular.

    The Federal Government had on Thursday issued a circular suspending residency training programmes for doctors.

    The country is currently groaning under the dearth of specialist doctors with 3,000 specialists to over 170 million Nigerians. Besides, there are over 25,000 Nigerian doctors in the United States and over 4,000 in the United Kingdom.

    The consequence of the government circular, according to a medical doctor with the National Hospital, Abuja, Ujam Kingsley,  is that in the next five-six years when the present ones passes out, there would be no specialist doctor in the country.

    The training which comes up immediately after National Youth Service, Dr. Ujam said lasts between six to eight years and it is designed to develop specialist doctors in different fields of medicine.

    Reacting to government’s order, NMA President, Dr. Kayode Obembe, noted that the current government’s stance will further worsen the present industrial harmony.

    Obembe insisted that government action was illegal as it did not follow the books, saying “It is our believe that the status book that established the residency training programme has not been followed.

    Residency Training programme is governed by status books.

    “No single person or individual no matter how highly placed can just directly and wishfully jettison all these documents and go and sack our doctors. It is illegal and we condemn it in its entirety. That is our position on that,” the NMA president said.

  • Confusion trails suspension of doctors’ strike

    The controversy trailing the suspension of doctors’ strike has taken another dimension with the reported resignation of the Nigeria Medical Association, president, Dr. Kayode Obembe on Friday.

    Though he has not officially tendered his resignation letter, a delegate to the emergency meeting told The Nation that Obembe posted his resignation on the association’s website.

    The letter was however not seen on the website when our checked the web portal on Friday.

    Though the situation is still sketchy at the time of filling this report, The Nation gathered that the NMA’s president resignation may not be unconnected with his stand on the strike which was suspended on Thursday through a press statement signed by him (Obembe).

    Obembe in the statement announcing the suspension of the strike noted that government had made positive move towards meeting the doctors’ demands.

    Besides, he also cited the current outbreak of Ebola in the country among many other issues for the suspension of the strike.

    However, a counter statement was later issued by a faction of the association and signed by the first and second president of NMA, Dr. Titus Ibekwe and Dr. Bartholomew Okorochukwu, distancing themselves from the suspension of the strike.

    They urged doctors to continue the strike until the federal government addressed all their demands.