Doctors at Zimbabwe’s state hospitals have rejected a government offer to hike their salaries and vowed to press on with a crippling strike, an official said on Friday.
”As the situation stands now, we are still on strike,” Kudakwashe Nyamutukwa, president of the Hospital Doctors’ Association, said.
”Our grievances still stand and [we are] waiting for the government to address them. The minister [for health and child welfare David Parirenyatwa] met senior doctors and said the government had increased doctors’ salaries with effect from this month, but he did not say by what percentage.”
Junior doctors stopped work three weeks ago, demanding their pay be increased from Z$56 000 ($224) to Z$5-million a month, Nyamutukwa said.
They also want the government to raise a car allowance loan from Z$700 000 to Z$2,5-million.
Zimbabwe is in the throes of a severe economic recession with four-digit inflation, massive unemployment and chronic shortages of food and essential goods.
State health institutions have been hit by an exodus of key staff who have left for greener pastures abroad. Medicines are in short supply and most of the equipment is either malfunctioning or obsolete.
Junior Health Minister Edwin Muguti said the government would hike salaries but did not give figures.
”We are going to meet them half way and give them a salary increase. All I can say at this stage is that it is a handsome package and it is for all health workers.
”We are now urging the doctors to return to work and we will only give salaries to those who return to work.
The junior doctors first began a work boycott three weeks ago when they limited the number of patients they would attend but soon stepped up their protest into an all-out strike.
Patients are bearing the brunt of the crisis as nurses, senior state health consultants and foreign doctors grapple to attend to overwhelming numbers of patients. — Sapa-AFP