Comrade Joy Josiah is the president of Medical and Health Workers Union. In this interview with MOSES JOHN he spoke on why the union does go on strike. Excerpt.
After your emergence as the new president of MHWUN, what should health workers expects?
Like you all rightly know I was elected on 29 April 2015 to replace the one everybody will like to agree with me is the most worth president of the medical and health workers union of all time, Ayuba Wabba. My policy is not to deplete what I have met on ground.
I intend to add to what I have met. That is my mission. I have a similar history like Ayuba, from where I am coming. I used to be the state chairman of Bayelsa state medical and health workers union. I inherited negative on the state level, no landed property no anything. But today, Bayelsa state secretariat of MHWUN is the biggest and most modern in the whole of country. So, I think I have a culture. I am coming with a culture to learn and add to what I met on ground. So, I welcome you to the continues growth of MHWUN
In the next one year, what would you say you will add to the union?
I think while I will not be hasty to tell you A, B and C for now is obvious. To some extent, I am not saying the union is in the red, but like I said before, what I met on ground I don’t want to deep my hands into it. But where I consider to be my starting point right now, is also very rough owing to the fact that most states are not paying their civil servants and the ones that are paying are only paying net, they are not paying gross. So remittance, which is the main source of revenue to unions is now very lean. So until we stabilize, thanks to PMB who has released the bailout which we believe will be judiciously paid by governors, then I will pointedly tell why.
You are presiding over a sensitive union in the health sector.
In the past few months, you union has been at logger head with government over implementation of some agreements,so what kind of working relationship do you foresee with the present administration?
My predecessor did a lot. But I think the bane of arriving at a successful point was insincerity on the part of government. It is either the chief decision taker was not deliberately informed properly or information was distorted to him.
So towards the tail end of his administration, it was discovered that most of the things we were agitating for, the man at the top (president) was not even aware of them. So I can say there was a kind of dishonesty on the part of those who were representing government to deal with the unions. Chiefly because perhaps, there was a lot of chauvinism in the system where in the ministry of health, most of the directorates are headed by a particular cadre of personnel. So rather than take the issues of other cadres , they would always want to distort what goes up.
It is always about self-first. But with the current government, president Buhari has been in the system for a long time and has demonstrated that he is a man of honesty and discipline. So, I believe this issue of dishonesty and distortions at negotiations will stop. Let me also use this opportunity to say that most people think that workers in the health sector are strike mongers. This is not true.
The public should know that we don’t just go on strike because we love to. In all cases, we are forced to do so. For instance, there is an issue and first and foremost, you ask why are the workers going on strike? Are their reasons for going on strike frivolous? If it is not frivolous, you ask again, did they follow due process? And the answer to all these questions is yes. We have never embarked on any strike on frivolous reasons. We have only embarked on strike on reasons from genuine positions. And we have always followed due process.
Then the question is, why would they be allowed to go on strike? The answer is government. For instance, there is a disagreement and the union writes to the government giving it 21 days to address some of its grievances, it doesn’t mean that government has to wait until the expiration of the 21 days. But those claimed crisis managers in the system who believe that under crisis, they can make some more money would want to see your letter of ultimatum. Ordinarily, the letter of notification would have enabled government to solve the problem before time. But they wouldn’t do that. They want to see your actions.
