Kwara health workers continue strike
Crisis rocks Kebbi Miyetti Allah over Buhari
he strike embarked upon by workers in the employ of Kwara State government in solidarity with their federal counterparts, continues today.
Daily Trust learnt that the health workers embarked on indefinite strike beginning from last Wednesday to demand for improved package from the state government.
Already, federal health workers have been on strike for almost two months crippling activities in university teaching hospitals and other federal institutions in the country.
In Kwara State, workers in University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital (UITH), Ilorin have complied totally with the strike as only medical doctors were attending to patients.
However, the state-owned health institutions which had been filling the gaps created by the strike have also joined.
The striking health workers include the National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives, Community Health Extension Workers, Laboratory Technicians and Environmental Health Officers Association of Nigeria, among others.
They are agitating for the complete implementation of consolidated salary structure for health officers in all health institutions in the state.
Some of the institutions affected by the strike include Sobi Specialist Hospital, Alagbado, Civil Service Clinic, GRA Ilorin, and Children Specialist Hospital, and Centre Igboho. The strike has stalled health care delivery in most of the institutions.
When contacted, the state Commissioner for Health, Alhaji Abdul Kayode Issa, said the strike was in solidarity with their counterparts at the federal level, dismissing allegations of inadequate welfare raised by the workers. The Kebbi State executives of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association have suspended their chairman, Alhaji Muhammadu Dan Ali, from office for alleged involvement in partisan politics and promoting factionalism.
The state general secretary, Alhaji Bello Gotomo, announced this at the weekend in Birnin Kebbi.
But when Dan Ali was contacted by our correspondent, he debunked his suspension saying: “It is not true, I was falsely accused of those two allegations without giving me fair hearing or setting up a committee by my exco or the national body to investigate me or even the government if it has any interest on these issues.
“The whole thing is about a form sent to us from Buhari Support Group in Abuja that has relevance on how to sensitise Nigerians on ensuring free, fair and credible elections. The forms are to set up a committee from polling unit to national level to guide against election fraud. All the excos took part in the mini-meeting I summoned when we received the forms.
“That was how politicians accused me of joining the opposition APC to support Muhammadu Buhari,” he said.
“That was also how the Commissioner of Finance, Bello Tuga reported me to the State Commissioner of Police and Director State Security who invited me for clarification and gave us the go ahead after I have explained the agenda of the meeting.
“It was after this meeting that I heard of a ganging up that I have moved to the APC and I should be removed in a single day since I am not supporting the ruling PDP.
“I will challenge such unconstitutional act through the same avenue that they have employed because I don’t think anybody has the right to prevent anybody from discussing Buhari,” he explained.
The Commissioner of Police, Alhaji Ishaku Barau, when contacted on phone, confirmed that the police and DSS jointly invited the embattled chairman based on complain from the commissioner of finance.