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Olabode Adaramola
The Niger State Commissioner of Health and Hospital Services , Dr. Mohammed Mohammed Makusidi has said that the State Ministry of Health has saved about N200million from the staff verification and screening exercise carried out by the state hospital management board.
Dr. Makusidi, who led the management members of the ministry to a weekly radio Niger audience participatory programme, ‘Contact’, last weekend stated that the screening exercise was an eye opener for the ministry because they discovered that some people were collecting more than their supposed salary.
He said prior to the exercise, the state health workers were only paid 70 percent of their salary, but that they now enjoy full payment of their salary with other benefits without the government providing an additional fund to that effect.
The Commissioner added that transferring the control of health workers at the local government level and their salary to the state primary healthcare development agency was the best for both the state and the workers at that level.
He said the ministry through the agency will soon embark on verification and screening of health workers at the local government level and urged the 25 local government councils in the state to support the process.
He further disclosed that the shortage of health workers witnessed in some of the primary health care facilities across the state were artificial as some workers only receive salary at the end of the month without going to work.
The Commissioner, also revealed that he recently directed that a particular healthcare facility be closed down and the workrs sacked due to dereliction of duty, adding that the ministry was committed to sanitizing the system in order to achieve improved healthcare service delivery in the state.
He explained that paying salary of the Primary healthcare workers through the agency would be more beneficial to them as every genuine worker will get what is due for him, saying the workers at the local government level do not enjoy some of the benefits they deserve such as the shift allowance and recently Covid allowance.
He urged the primary healthcare workers to be patient as the delay in the payment of their salary was not caused by the agency but saboteurs who do not want the process undertaken to succeed because of their hidden agenda.
Dr. Makusidi also admitted that there was shortage of manpower in the health sector, revealing that there were about 2000 vacancies that needed to be filled, but that because of the irregularities in the salary they could not fill the gap, though they have gotten approval of Governor Abubakar Sani Bello to recruit 600 health workers.
On the attitude of health workers towards patients and their relations which most callers complained about, Dr. Mohammed Makusidi said it was worrisome and that they were doing their best as management to discipline erring staff, urging the public to report any unwanted attitude from their staff.
He said as health workers, they were expected to be professionally discipline in all their conduct and that the ministry was committed to discipline erring staff, stressing that despite the attitude of some health workers in the public healthcare facilities, the public hospitals were far better than the private ones and urged the general public to patronize them.
Similarly, the Executive Director of Niger State Primary Healthcare Development Agency, represented by Director of Community Health services, Dr. Hauwa Kolo confirmed that the agency had taken over control of the health workers at the local government level for lack of consistency as anarchy reigns at the local government level, saying they want to sanitize the system and make it work by disciplining erring staff.
She said transferring of the primary healthcare workers’ salary to the agency will make efforts of the agency towards sanitizing the system more effective and urged the workers to be patient and support the process because it is for their own good.
