13th September, 2017
The National Executive Council (NEC) of the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) is meeting in Abuja to appraise the implementation of its agreement with the Federal Government.
The NEC is scheduled to hold the meeting at 8 p.m on Wednesday in the FCT-Abuja to assess government response to the demands made by the association.
A source at the meeting confided in NAN that a position would be adopted at the end of the meeting.
The source appealed to Nigerians to bear the situation as members of the association were pressing government to improve the healthcare delivery system in the country.
NARD embarked on a nationwide indefinite strike to press home a six-point demand.
The association had on Sept. 6 laid out terms of settlement with the federal government after the two parties met to resolve the crisis.
Among other demands, the doctors are protesting the sack of some of their colleagues, non-payment of “skipping’’ entitlement, non-inclusion in the IPPIS platform and non-payment of their salary arrears.
The federal government at the meeting had agreed to terms of settlement with the association, assuring that it will pay the arrears and commence the inclusion of NARD members in the IPPIS platform.
In an earlier interview with NAN, Dr Arikawe Adeolu, a member of the National Executive Council of NARD, said the association was waiting on the federal government to redeem its pledge before the strike could be called off.
Adeolu said that more than half of members of the association were yet to receive their arrears, claiming that government is also yet to meet its other demands in the terms of settlement.
He said that the association would therefore hold a meeting to assess the response of government to its demands.
“We were supposed to hold a meeting on Sept. 8 but it didn’t hold because the essence of the meeting was defeated.
“We thought that government would have paid by then but we got nothing so the meeting has been postponed to September 12; it will be a closed door meeting to carry out an appraisal of events so far,’’ he said.
The meeting which was slated to hold on Sept. 12 was however rescheduled to hold on Sept. 13.