The Ministry of Health has assured medical workers under the Uganda Medical Association (UMA) that their demand for salary increment will be met in due course.
UMA is an umbrella body comprising over 6,000 medical personnel.
Dr Diana Atwiine, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Health, says the leadership at UMA and MOH officials have engaged in multiple meetings to find solutions to the dilemma raised by the medical association.
Atwiine’s remarks follow a pending strike by UMA after a notice of strike to the government ended last evening. The medical practitioners issued an ultimatum to the government three months ago promising to lay down their tools if salaries of interns and doctors at all levels were not revised upwards.
UMA issued a 90-day ultimatum from Friday August 6, to the second week of November for the Government to address their needs.
Through the outgoing President, Dr Richard Idro, the medics in August 2021 petitioned the Minister of Public Service, Wilson Muruuli Mukasa, explaining why their demands must be met this time around.
Their demands include, among others, recruiting more staff because of inadequacy, lack of personal protective equipment (PPEs), an unfulfilled pledge by the government to increase their gross pay to Shs 3 million and to better the working conditions of Intern Medical Doctors, among others.
Dr Atwiine explains that the Ministry of Health is in talks with the ministries of finance and public service to enhance the salaries. She adds that the Health Ministry is also liaising with the Ministry of Gender regarding compensation of families where doctors died in the line of duty.
“Government is not like an individual that you wake up and do something overnight, but I can assure you that the process has started and meetings have been held with Public service and Finance Ministries and I believe that it will take place at our time. I am very optimistic, only that government takes a while but it doesn’t lie. Please be patient,” Atwiine said.
However, Herbert Luswata, the incoming UMA Secretary General, says they held another meeting with the Vice President, Gen. Jessica Alupo, on Friday and the same promises of increasing their pay were made. He could neither deny nor confirm whether the strike will happen but said the medical body will soon release official communication.
“We are still new and organizing ourselves but we shall come out soon, we shall communicate in a press conference,” he said.
According to their petition UMA says at least 1,113 doctors remain unemployed despite acute understaffing in the country’s health facilities and a heavy workload.
Of the 5,247 doctor posts available in public service, 3,124 are vacant. The problem is apparently much bigger at consultancy and senior consultancy levels where 75 percent of the jobs are unoccupied.
In their petition, UMA says they have consistently aired out their grievances with official notices since 2017 in vain.
“U.M.A has over the past 21 months written letters, met with and engaged the relevant Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies to discuss these critical health systems gaps including human capital development and other emerging issues and especially these challenges visited upon us by Covid19 with little success,” Idro informed the Ministry of Public service.
“Government should also compensate all the 50 plus health workers who have died in the line of duty (Doctors, Nurses, Midwives, Clinical Officers, Laboratory personnel, support staff) and those among the 3,000 plus who were infected and survived but with substantive injuries as well as paying the Covid19 risk allowances without taxation to all frontline healthcare professionals,” the petition further reads.
