26th August, 2014
The House of Representatives Committee on Health on Monday called on the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA) to apologise to Nigerians over its 55-day old strike.
The Chairman of the committee, Rep. Ndudi Elumelu, told journalists in Abuja that the apology became necessary because the strike caused Nigerians inconveniences as well as loss of lives.
“The committee is delighted with the suspension of the strike by the NMA,” Elumelu said.
He said the committee appreciated the efforts of President Goodluck Jonathan for the round table he held with the leadership of the association.
Elumelu also expressed gratitude to the Senate President, David Mark and the Speaker, House of Representative, Aminu Tambuwal, for intervening and providing the committee the needed support.
He urged the NMA to work with Federal Government in line with resolutions the two parties reached through the committee’s intervention on July 21, 2014.
Part of the agreement, he added, was that the “Federal Government shall pay two months salary arrears to members of NMA on or before 31 July”.
“The balance of salary arrears would be reflected in 2015 budget and paid to members of NMA and new salary structure be reflected as well as among others.
The chairman also said that Nigerians had a lot to learn from the strike in order to avert reoccurrence of such development in the future.
He said one of such lessons was the need to obey agreements, adding that if parties had obeyed previous agreements between NMA and Federal Government, the strike would have been averted.
“The lesson here is that we must at all times obey contents of agreements freely entered into in order to avert crisis,” he said.