– Bayelsa doctors are in despair as their autumn salaries are yet to be paid
– The protesting medics demand the federal government to pay them as soon as possible
– They even said they are considering MMM as an option to feed their families.
Last week hundreds of doctors took to the streets of Yenagoa, Bayelsa state, to protest against unpaid four-months salaries owed them by the federal government.
The desperate medics even threatened to stop providing medical care to patients giving November 15 as the last date to repay all the debts.
The Association of Resident Doctors have recently met the Federal Medical Centre authorities to discuss the issue, however, the results left a lot to be desired.
The doctors led by Dr. Nonso Okoye, their chairman, were seen carrying placards saying “Our families are hungry”, “FG pay our salaries” and “We are hungry, MMM is becoming an option”.
According to the protesters, they were paid just half of their salary from February to May this year and still awaiting September and October payments.
The said: “We want the federal government to pay us our monies. We have not withdrawn services. All we are saying is for the government to pay us for work done.
Nigerians should prevail on the federal government to pay us. As much as we don’t want to withdraw our services, we have resolved to withdraw the services by 15th of November if nothing is done.
We have met with the management but all they did was pay us a month salary. They told us that the budget available cannot pay salary.”
Commenting on the issue, Dennis Alagoa, the chief medical director of the Federal Medical Centre (FMC), said: “With Tuesday’s statement by President Muhammadu Buhari, we are assured that the issue will be resolved soon.”
He also stressed that there’s no sense in a strike as the local management is not responsible for the issue and the matter has been already studied by the federal government officials.
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