55 days on nothingness!

At the beginning of the recently-suspended 55 days-old strike by the NMA, I wrote about the relief an average Nigerian doctor feels at the thought of a strike action. I also wrote about the seeming inefficacy of strikes in Nigeria and the fact that the strife between NMA and JOHESU was one that needed to be settled at a round table. The public need not suffer over a family feud, the shrubs need not lose their roots because of a power tussle between two or three elephants.

With the suspension of the strike, one would assume that the NMA has been given its demand. Alas, we haven't. According to the NMA president, the strike was suspended because of the National emergency and talks would continue with the government on the demands that instigated the downing of tools in the first place.
55 days and nothing to show for it,  you would say; but that's not true, at least the National health bill has been passed into law: but we all know that being passed into law isn't the same as implementation. Experience has made that clear.

 The NMA is faced with one challenge they didn't start with though- the suspended residency programme. If the FG claims they want to overhaul the whole programme, then I suppose that we still have 16000 doctors unemployed as at today.
If however, this circular is reversed and the suspension is annulled, then the government will prove again that it is not a government of its words and the suspension was only an attempt to subdue the strongest arm of the NMA . After all, the suspension of the programme was in the best interest of the nation abi?

Dear colleagues, in the eyes of the masses, we are selfish and have lost our respect, in the eyes of our immediate family members we are ' poor things ', in the eyes of some other health workers, we are pathetic losers; different people have tagged and qualified us with unbefitting words.
However, let it be clear to all that the Nigerian doctor has been used and abused, bartered and insulted but will yet serve this country as best as he can, despite the inadequacies of the health sector.

A few weeks from now, every other party will forget this happened, apart from the real victims: the families that lost loved ones and the doctors who have been termed evil.
Corridor consultations will begin again, but only the unwise will continue this trend.

In the nearest future, let us hope that the NMA or ARD will not have to down their tools again. Let us hope that the health sector will thrive and prosper and let us hope that the rivalry in this sector will not lead to anarchy and a complete topple of the already crumbling sector.

God bless Nigeria.