Panic as health staff strike looms

In an apparent act of desperation, government yesterday met representatives of healthcare workers to avert their pending sit-in on June 10 but the meeting hit a deadlock.

According to sources that attended the meeting at Sunbird Lilongwe, leaders of National Organisation of Nurses and Midwives  of Malawi(Nonm) and Physician Assistants Union of Malawi (Paum) insisted that the sit-in can only be called off after their demands are met.

One source said the Attorney General (AG) Thabo Chakaka Nyirenda, who led the government side, had called for the meeting and the healthcare workers granted him an audience.

However, the source said the AG and team brought nothing new or concrete on the table, as such, the healthcare workers representatives opted to proceed with their plans to hold a strike.

Said the source: “The meeting with the Minister of Health did not bear any fruit and members agreed that they will no longer be attending government meetings.”

Another attendee corroborated the sentiments, saying there was “nothing meaningful” from yesterday’s meeting.

Nyirenda, who for about two hours was locked in a closed-door meeting with leaders of Nonm and Paum members with Malawi Human Rights Commission (MHRC) executive secretary Habiba Osman as an observer, refused to grant media interviews,

“How did you [the media] know we were meeting? This was a closed door meeting,” he said.

Osman, who was a conciliator in earlier discussions between the two parties, also refused to speak on the matter, saying she was just a spectator in the meeting.

She said Nyirenda and lawyer for Nonm and Paum were best placed to comment.

But both lawyers also declined to grant an interviews as did leaders of the unions.

Nonm and Paum members have threatened to hold a nationwide strike on June 10 2024 following government’s lack of commitment to resolve their grievances which include demands to increase their allowances and to improve working conditions.

Meanwhile, Malawi Health Equity Network executive director George Jobe has said Mhen is making efforts to bring the two sides to a roundtable and prevent the sit-in.

In a separate interview, Health Rights Education Programme executive director Maziko Matemba called on government to continue engaging the health workers on their demands.

Following the collapse of their talks with government, the healthcare workers set June 10 2024 for a day-long sit-in.

The date for the sit-in comes after Capital Hill warned against the industrial action, saying Section 47 of the Labour Relations Act prohibits essential service providers, such as healthcare workers from conducting a strike.

Ministry of Health spokesperson Adrian Chikumbe is on record as having said the ministry was hopeful of continued engagement, but warned against the decision to strike.