The AMM had complained that the government delegation had no decision making powers. But on Wednesday, Prime Minister Alberto Vaquina, wrote to the AMM explained that the delegation was fully mandated to take decisions.
With that hurdle out of the way, all seemed set for a further round of talks on Friday. But the government team insisted that it would not talk to the AMM in the presence of representatives of a second organisation involved in the strike, the Commission of United Health Professionals (PSU).
Since the AMM would not meet the government without the PSU, the talks were once again at an impasse.
Last week, it was believed that the government had reluctantly accepted that the PSU could participate in the meetings, but on Friday the National Director of Public Health, Mouzinho Saide, declared that the government team has a mandate to negotiate with the AMM, and not with other organisations.
“We think the conditions for dialogue have not been created because the AMM has changed the procedures established at the start of the talks and has involved a group called the Commission of United Health Professionals in its negotiating team”, said Saide. He added that the government could meet with the PSU, but not around the same table as the AMM.
Saide insisted that the head of the government negotiating team, the Permanent Secretary in the Health Ministry, Marcelino Lucas, had always made it clear that dialogue with the doctors would not include the PSU.
However, AMM spokesperson Paulo Samo Gudo repeated that the AMM will not continue any dialogue with the government if the latter insists on excluding the PSU. “This s a strike by health professionals, of which the doctors are a part”, he told reporters. “It makes no sense to solve the problem of the doctors and leave the other health professionals to their fate”.
The PSU was set up in January, and has not yet been legally recognised as an association. Nobody knows how many health workers it represents – both the National Association of Nurses (ANEMO), and the Association of Laboratory Technicians say they know nothing about the PSU and have dissociated themselves from the strike.
On Saturday, President Armando Guebuza visited the country’s largest health unit, Maputo Central Hospital (HCM), and urged the striking doctors to reconsider their position and return to work “because human life has no price”.
He also expressed his solidarity with those health workers who had not joined the strike, praising the “heroism” of those who left everything else aside and continued to attend to the sick.
After visiting the paediatric, orthopaedic and emergency services, Guebuza said it was clear that many health workers – doctors, nurses, auxiliary and administrative staff – were indeed concerned about the patients, and even when they personally were suffering from fatigue they were doing all in their power to guarantee health care for the sick.
In a clear reference to the AMM’s demand for a 100 per cent rise in doctors’ basic wage, Guebuza declared “it’s not the money that counts, because life is sacred, and so they (the strikers) should return to work”.
Dialogue, he stressed, was not a matter of giving or taking orders, but one of presenting questions “in an orderly manner and seeking consensus, but without damaging the people, who should merit all necessary attention, and should not be prejudiced because of individual interests”.
Many people demand money, Guebuza said, but they should be aware that money is produced through work, and when money is distributed it should not prejudice investment in the future.
For the first time, the Ministry of Health has given an estimate, albeit a rather vague one, of the number of people participating in the strike. On a talk show on Mozambican Television (TVM) on Thursday night, Saide said “between 200 and 300” health workers were on strike, mostly in Maputo city and province. Much of the country was untouched by the strike – Saide said that in three provinces (Niassa, Cabo Delgado and Tete) not a single health worker had gone on strike.
AMM President Jorge Arroz, who was also on the programme, did not dispute these numbers.
A report in the latest issue of the independent weekly “Savana” indicates that the situation in Maputo hospitals is critical. At the HCM, for example, there has been an 80 per cent decline in the number of operations undertaken. Surgery is only undertaken in emergency cases, and operations scheduled in advance have been cancelled.
Post published in: Africa News