Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja
The representatives of the federal government to be led by the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, will Friday meet with the executive of the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD).
A statement issued by the ministry’s Deputy Director/Head of Press and Public Relations, Charles Akpan, said the meeting is scheduled to hold at the minister’s conference room by 3pm.
The resident doctors on Wednesday vowed to continue their strike, which is now a week old despite the federal government’s move on Wednesday to commence payment of arrears of salaries and allowances owed them.
Among the demands of the doctors are the immediate payment of all salary arrears including March salaries for their members in all federal (GIFMIS platform) and state tertiary health institutions across the country.
NARD also said: “None of these doctors who have worked for over four months has been paid.
“Our members in states like Abia, Imo and Borno are still been owed twenty, five and four months salaries respectively. Upward review of the current hazard allowance to 50 per cent of consolidated basic salaries of all health workers and payment of the outstanding COVID-19 inducement allowance.”
The doctors are also protesting the amount paid as hazard allowance, which they said had remained N5,000 for over 30 years.
