Nurses in public hospitals and clinics early this month
approached the High Court, through the Zimbabwe Nurses Association (ZNA),
seeking an interdict against Chiwenga’s directive for the removal of their
flexible working hours, commonly referred to as flexitime.
Flexitime was introduced as a result of a collective
bargaining agreement in January 2019 to allow nurses and doctors to report for
duty two or three times per week in view of their low remuneration, but
Chiwenga, upon assuming the position of Health minister, scrapped the
arrangement, prompting the nurses to seek legal recourse.
High Court judge Justice Martin Mafusire agreed that the
nurses had raised valid concerns relating to incapacitation and lack of
personal protective equipment for Covid-19, hitting out at Chiwenga saying he
acted against the spirit of fair negotiation by unilaterally ordering an end to
flexitime.
However, subsequent to the ruling, indications from the
ministry, which have courted the ire of nurses, are that government has no
intention of maintaining flexitime and that nurses who were removed from the
payroll for disobeying the vice-president’s directive “will have to get their
salaries from the court”.
The Health Services Board (HSB) this week confirmed it
removed about 1 200 nurses who had defied Chiwenga’s directive from the payroll
and they have not received their salaries for November.
ZNA president Enock Dongo said they were preparing another
legal challenge against Chiwenga if the nurses are not put back on the payroll.
“The minister, the permanent secretary and our employer the
Health Services Board were barred from carrying out suspensions and removal of
our nurses from the payroll, yet we still have some nurses who are on
suspension. Over 1 200 nurses were removed from the payroll and as far as the
judgement is concerned, they were barred from doing that and we expect
government to respect judgment and do as was said by the court,” Dongo said.
“We are aware of those statements (that they will not pay); we are waiting for
them to put them in writing so that we can take it back to the court because
that is clearly a contempt of court. We will obviously go back to the court
since we do not have any other remedy. What we have agreed and resolved is to
follow the law. We wrote back to them when the court made its ruling but they
have not responded to us.”
HSB corporate communications manager Tryfine Dzvikutu
confirmed there were nurses who were removed from the payroll, but said the
body would pay the nurses for the time they were at work.
“It’s not that they were punished; it was a labour related
position of no work, no pay. Obviously, the way forward in terms of the ruling
is to stand guided by the court. The nurses will be paid for time worked,” she
said.
In its letter to Chiwenga, which was copied to the HSB, but
was not responded to — according to Dongo — the ZNA said it was still keen to
engage in dialogue with government.
“We believe the judgment is self-explanatory. In
particular, it puts it beyond any reasonable doubt that your directive has been
set aside and anyone is barred from implementing it. We reiterate that we look
forward to working with you as we strive to improve the problems bedeviling the
health sector,” the letter, dated November 20, reads. Zimbabwe Independent
0 comments:
Post a Comment