Union activists have forced three doctors to resign from Middelburg hospital in Mpumalanga.
Mpumalanga’s Department of Health says it is investigating clashes between the doctors and members of the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) at the hospital and is considering taking action against the union.
Doctors at the hospital say they are unhappy about ”being intimidated by Nehawu”, but the union claims that some of the doctors are racist and insensitive towards patients.
Tensions erupted in July when Nehawu members allegedly threw Dr Roy van Eijden off the hospital premises.
Dumisani Mlangeni, provincial health spokesperson, said disciplinary hearings were in progress and the department hoped the situation would soon be resolved. ”Nehawu took the law into their own hands. There are better ways in which to handle a situation,” he said.
Criminal charges have been laid against Solly Maseko and Vusimusi Mahlangu, Nehawu shop stewards who reportedly instigated the incident.
A doctor said the trouble started after a relative of Maseko and Mahlangu died while under Van Eijden’s care.
Nehawu’s national spokesperson Moloantoa Molaba said two patients had died because of the conduct of white doctors. ”The union then held a meeting the next morning to decide on a course of action,” he said. Nehawu decided to ask Van Eijden to leave and he was escorted off the premises.
Molaba denied that Van Eijden was assaulted. ”We have no regrets over our actions. Tensions have been building up at the hospital. The doctors have too much influence at the hospital and transformation hasn’t been addressed. We also believe that the doctors are racist and have been insensitive in their treatment of patients, both black and white.”
Three other doctors have resigned from Middelburg hospital. Another is now working only part time.
Christene Smith, one of the disillusioned doctors who resigned, left on August 16 and wants nothing more to do with the hospital because of the working conditions and the intimidation by Nehawu members.
”I never dreamt I would work in such demoralising circumstances,” she said. ”I wanted to make a difference, but it is very difficult if you’re victimised the whole time. The troublemakers are allowed to roam freely in the hospital.”
She said she realised she had to get away the day Van Eijden was thrown out of the hospital. ”I could see the fear in Roy’s eyes. That morning the people from Nehawu also followed us around and accused us of manhandling patients. I was scared that we were also going to be thrown out.”
Smith will be moving to England at the end of the year because she no longer feels safe practising medicine in South Africa.
Two other doctors, Mohammad Peer and Hanlie Craven, also resigned.
Sources at the hospital said Nehawu members had harassed doctors over their treatment of patients.
”It is incredibly difficult to do your job properly if you are constantly looking over your shoulder in fear of being assaulted,” one doctor said.
The resignations have severely affected services at the under-staffed hospital. ”A big problem was that the young doctors had no proper supervision because the hospital is so low on staff,” said Keith Michael, health director of the Highveld region.
His office had tried to improve the situation by recruiting local general practitioners. ”Private GPs now help out at the outpatient department in the mornings. This helps hospital doctors to get through their rounds and daily tasks.
”Nehawu often raises issues of concerns at hospitals,” said Michael. ”They are not always negative and some are valid issues that need to be addressed.”
Michael said the lack of staff and consequently the overworked personnel had contributed to the problems. ”We are trying to obtain the services of more senior doctors to avert such problems in the future.”
In September Peter Matthews, head of family planning at the hospital, won an interdict to prevent Maseko and Mahlangu from harassing him. Judge AJ de Jager also included MEC for Health Sibongile Manana in the interdict, though Matthews denies including her in his request. ”The judge decided that by himself.”
Mlangeni said the interdict had complicated any investigation because the MEC had trouble accessing the hospital.