The National President of NARD, Dr Emeka Orji, disclosed this in an interview with our correspondent on Wednesday.

Orji said though the planned nationwide protest was suspended, the association was giving the Federal Government 72 hours to meet some of its urgent demands to call off its strike.

According to him, the association will decide to continue or call off the strike by Friday, August 12.

The striking doctors had earlier planned to commence a daily peaceful protest, starting from Wednesday, August 9, 2023, if the government fails to meet their demands.

Orji said, “We had a fruitful meeting yesterday (Tuesday) at the Villa and with the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, so it will not be good to have that level of meeting and the next day we hit the streets to protest, it will look as if there is an ulterior motive behind our demands.

“Our demands are germane because there is a shortage of doctors in our hospitals, so the few of us remaining are being overworked. How long are we going to continue like that? They have told us what they will do today (Wednesday), and tomorrow (Thursday), and we are hopeful they will do the needful. If they are able to do those things, then I am sure the National Executive Committee will give us the mandate to suspend the strike because we are very understanding.

“The circular for one-for-one replacement is the first and the 2023 MRTF fund is the second one. If they are able to address them, we will appeal to our members to suspend the strike while we continue to negotiate for all the salary arrears, skipping arrears, and other things.”

Orji said it should not be difficult for the government to implement the one-for-one replacement without extra expenses.

“The government has the list of those who have left and it is a matter of replacing them immediately and the new ones that are recruited are paid the salary you have budgeted to replace those who have left. So, it is not difficult to do. This is a thing that has been agreed to be done since February but nothing has been done about it, but we are hoping the government will do as agreed,” he added.

NARD gave the ultimatum after its Extraordinary National Executive Council meeting held via Zoom on Wednesday.

President of NARD, Dr Emeka Orji, said “We are issuing a two-week ultimatum to the Federal Government to meet our demands with effect from today, Wednesday, July 5 to Friday, July 19, 2023.

“Unfortunately, none of the demands that made us embark on the five-day warning strike have been met. The government has not attended to any of them even after signing the Memorandum of Understanding. All the timelines on the demands have passed.

“The circular for one-on-one replacement was signed in the MoU that it will be released on or before June 5, 2023, and this is over a month, nothing has been done and it has not been released. The government said the payment of the 2023 Medical Residency Training Fund will be paid when the 2023 fiscal year starts, we learnt the fiscal year started last month and up till now, it has not been paid.

“If the government does not meet our demands at the end of the ultimatum on July 19, industrial harmony cannot be guaranteed and from the feelers we have, it will no longer be a warning strike, it will definitely be an indefinite strike.”

resident doctors in the country embarked on a five-day warning strike on May 17 to 21, 2023, to press home their demands.

The association had signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the government to address the issues raised by the resident doctors.

The doctors are demanding an immediate increment in the Consolidated Medical Salary Structure to the tune of 200 per cent of the current gross salary of doctors, immediate massive recruitment of clinical staff in the hospitals; immediate withdrawal of the bill seeking to compel medical and dental graduates to render five-year compulsory services in Nigeria before being granted full licences to practise; immediate infrastructural development in the hospitals with a subsequent allocation of at least 15 per cent of the budgetary provisions to health in line with the 2001 Abuja declaration.

They are also demanding the immediate massive recruitment of clinical staff in the hospitals and the abolishment of the bureaucratic limitations to the immediate replacement of doctors and Nurses who leave the system.

Other demands are the immediate payment of the 2023 MRTF in line with the agreements reached at the stakeholders’ meeting convened by the Federal Ministry of Health on February 15, 2023; among others.

There is a resurgence of COVID-19 in China following the relaxation of the country’s zero-COVID policy, as well as significantly increased COVID-19 cases, admissions, and deaths in the United Kingdom and the United States of America over the past weeks driven partly by the usual winter exacerbations of respiratory illnesses. The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has maintained that country-targeted travel restrictions including requests for PCR-negative tests from incoming travellers had little or no effect on preventing global and national circulation of omicron since the emergence of this variant and its relatives with their shorter incubation period.

The President of the National Association of Resident Doctors, Dr Emeka Orji, said the government should make plans to protect its citizens from a resurgence of COVID-19.

Orji said, “We need to act now because we don’t even have enough doctors to handle the current challenges we have in the health sector.

If we now have a major pandemic, it will only worsen the situation because what we have at hand now, we don’t even have enough medical personnel to take care of them and that is why you have an increase in waiting time in the hospital and rescheduling of surgeries.”

Also, the President of the Academy of Medicine Specialities of Nigeria, Prof Oladapo Ashiru, said the country must act fast to prevent another pandemic.

Anybody coming from China must come with a negative COVID-19 test, they must be screened and they must guard their contacts and maintain vigilance and after they come with a negative test, they must repeat the test after a week. If we don’t do that, we are going to be in a problem,” he said.

The President of the Association of Nigerian Private Medical Practitioners, Dr Kayode Adesola, also urged the government to restrict travellers from China to avoid a resurgence in the country.

“Prevention is better than cure and that is the more reason the government needs to act on preventing any case from China. They should not think of whatever they gain from China but think of the ultimate thing, which is life,” he said.

On his part, the Chairman of the National Association of Nigerian Nurses and Midwives, Lagos State Council, Olurotimi Awojide, said nurses were concerned that the government is yet to impose restrictions on travellers from China.

“The government should be proactive and not wait until we have cases before placing restrictions. The world is a global village and we are closely connected. I am worried because we don’t have the human capacity to cope with any pandemic at this time and people have gone back to their normal activities; people need to be very cautious again,” Awojide said.