3 July 2009
MORE than 300 health workers in Ndola have been asked to exculpate themselves or face disciplinary charges for allegedly going on an illegal strike.
However, their union has rejected the move and sent back to management teams the charge letters insisting that the Government had extended amnesty to all employees.
Civil Servants and Allied Workers Union of Zambia (CSAWUZ) Ndola branch chairperson Joy Beene and Health Workers Union of Zambia (HWUZ) president Chrispin Sampa confirmed the development.
Mr Sampa and Mr Beene said in separate interviews that about 200 nurses and paramedics at Ndola Central Hospital (NCH) had received the letters while 116 were from 20 clinics under the district health management team.
Mr Beene said his union had advised members to send back the letters to management and that it would ensure that no one was victimised.
"The truth of the matter is that most health workers in Ndola were forced to report for work on Tuesday because police officers were harassing them and even detained some of them," he said.
Mr Sampa said the general membership felt "ambushed" by the decision to issue exculpatory letters because the issue was never discussed between the Government and the unions when the two parties were brokering the calling off of the strike.
"The issuing of exculpatory letters is an act of intimidation and total excessiveness on the part of the hospital managements in Ndola and other parts of the Copperbelt where the letters were issued," Mr Sampa said.
He said he was tipped that in some parts of the country like Central Province exculpatory letters were written but they had not been given out.
But Ministry of Health acting spokesperson Elizabeth Chizema said the amnesty would not apply to those refusing to exculpate themselves for failing to report for work on Monday this week.
Dr Chizema urged the health workers in Ndola and other areas to quickly exculpate themselves for not reporting for work on Monday.
"My only advice to the affected health workers is that they should as quickly as possible state the reasons why they did not report for work on Monday. Amnesty will only apply to those who will respond," she said.
Meanwhile, University of Zambia (UNZA) council chairperson Tukiya Kankasa-Mabula yesterday met members from the three unions at the institution and pleaded with them to resume work.
University of Zambia Professional Association (UNZAPROSSA) secretary Joseph Daka said the union leaders from all the unions would today meet to chart the way forward following the address by Dr Kankasa-Mabula.
The three unions are the University of Zambia Lecturers and Researchers Union, the University of Zambia and Allied Workers Union and UNZAPROSSA.
And Labour Minister Austin Liato also appealed to UNZA lecturers to resume work because illegal strikes have never yielded desirable results.
Mr Liato said it was important for the workers to embrace collective bargaining to ensure industrial harmony.
The minister was reacting to the continued go-slow by lecturers and support staff at the country's highest institution of learning.
He said in an interview in Lusaka yesterday that all the workers in the country should know that the global economic recession was real and should not think that the Government was deliberately denying them better salaries and good conditions of service.
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