Resident Doctors Declare Nationwide Strike

The National Association of Resident Doctors of Nigeria (NARD), has declared an indefinite strike action on the ground that the Federal Government has refused to empower residency training in the country.

Addressing a news conference in Kano, the association’s National President,  Dr Jibril Abdullahi threatened that all state hospitals would be shut down if the Enugu State Teaching Hospital did not implement the consolidated medical salary structure within 21 days.

According to the association, the persistent unwillingness of the federal government to articulate a comprehensive guidelines for residency training in Nigeria has eventually led to inadequate funding of residency training, citing the failure of the recently re-introduced overseas clinical attachments for resident doctors and of course the incessant industrial disharmony in many training centres as some of the reasons for the resident doctors industrial action.

Dr Abdullahi then resolved that the federal government would have to produce a blueprint on residency training with immediate effect and sort out all irregularities on the implementation of the integrated payroll and personnel information system, IPPIS, otherwise the strike would continue to be total and indefinite one.