TUESDAY- 5th October, 2021: The National Association of Residence Doctors, (NARD), said it will meet in 6 weeks’ time to discuss the progress of implementations of the agreements made with the Federal Government.

The association revealed that after a careful assessment of all efforts made by the Federal and State governments to prevent issues that led to the strike, it met with the National Executive Council, (NEC), and voted to end the strike.

NARD had on August 2 embarked on industrial action over unpaid salaries, benefits to families of members that lost their lives to the COVID-19 pandemic, poor hazard allowances, and failure to domesticate the Medical Residency Training Act 2017 in states, among others.

President of the association, Dr. Dare Ishaya while speaking to newsmen said, the association will meet after 6 weeks to evaluate the progress of implementation of terms it made with the Federal Government.

“When we went on the strike, we were not directly engaging the government as it were and we were taken to the court and because of that, there was no active discussion between us and the government.

“When we came in, we met with the government and they were ready to offer us some things and we said let’s catch up with the windows of negotiations that the government has offered.He also urged the state governments to urgently pay arrears of salaries and allowances owed to resident doctors in their various state tertiary health institutions.

“We urge the state governments to ensure domestication of the Medical Residency Training Act in their State Tertiary Health Institutions as done in Delta and Benue states,” he added.

“So that we can return to work and reduce the sufferings of the Nigerian masses. We will resume while we continue to reappraise the situation after six weeks of resumption.

“We will review the progress we are making with the federal government because if some payments have started coming in, we expect that that should continue but if we discover that the government is reneging again, then we will decide on the way forward; whether we should drop the issues and move on or make other suggestions,” The association’s president said.

Dr. Dare then urged the government to urgently pay arrears of salaries and allowances owed to resident doctors in their various state tertiary health institutions.

“We urge the state governments to ensure domestication of the Medical Residency Training Act in their State Tertiary Health Institutions as done in Delta and Benue states,” Ishaya added.