Chronicle Editor
President Mnangagwa is back at work, well ahead of the scheduled end of his annual leave.
The main reason why he has taken this extraordinary step is because the country is facing an extraordinary challenge in its health services sector, a challenge that is being rightly taken as a national security threat, not just a threat to the health of patients.
What the President has done is significant in a number of ways.
First, he has shown leadership. Good leaders put the common good ahead of their personal comfort.
He had only been a few days into his deserved annual leave after a hectic 13 months of hard work but he is back to tackle the emergency.
Since he assumed power on November 24, 2017, the President had not taken leave which means he had been working for a year and a month non-stop.
Second, the action he has taken demonstrates that he, at a personal level and the Government he leads recognises the criticality of addressing the crippling junior doctors’ strike.
Now, if the doctors were not convinced that the Government takes their jobs seriously, that the employer wants their grievances addressed and above all that patients’ lives are preserved, the President’s return to work so early must hammer those points home very strongly.
Junior doctors have been on an illegal strike for about a month, probably their second job stoppage in 12 months.
They are demanding US dollar salaries and want the Government to make more medical drugs and consumables available in public hospitals and clinics.
It has been a very devastating strike that has forced some major hospitals to close their outpatient departments as a result of shortage of doctors to attend to patients.
We cannot rule out the possibility that some patients may have lost their lives unnecessarily since there are no doctors to attend to them.
Government has been engaging the doctors all along, even after the court had ruled their strike illegal.
It was announced after their latest meeting on Monday that the employer had made concessions in a majority of issues except two.
That, however, did not convince the doctors to return to work, not only because the employer had committed to addressing a majority of their grievances but also as a way to show respect for the rule of law in the light of the court order.
Presidential spokesperson Mr George Charamba, as quoted in our leading story today, says extraordinary decisions would be taken soon to stop further destruction of the health sector and loss of life.
“Administratively and legally, there is a limit to powers which an Acting President can wield,” said Mr Charamba.
“And in any event, the style has always been that the Acting President consults with the substantive President. Now in this particular case we have a serious situation in the health sector involving lives and naturally, the President has to demonstrate concern and that concern comes by way of cutting short his leave in order to work closely with the Acting President so that consultations are short circuited. It’s really for purposes of quick decision-making given that there has to be constant consultation between the two. In fact, barely a day passes without telephone communication between the Acting President and the President. Now the President has come to deal with a situation in situ and that is meant to demonstrate seriousness of Government’s approach to issues.”
We feel that the Government has been very sincere in its negotiations with the junior doctors, giving concessions where possible but rejecting other grievances for their impracticability such as the employees’ demand for US$ salaries.
Among other concessions, the Government has said a vehicle loan scheme for the doctors will be made available while much effort is being made to ensure that public health institutions are well stocked in terms of drugs and consumables.
We have no reason to doubt that the Government wants the legitimate welfare issues of junior doctors addressed, just as it wants to address the welfare issues of tens of thousands more civil servants.
However, the employer’s capacity to address them is curtailed by the economic challenges the country is facing.
It appears to us that it is probably the doctors alone who aren’t appreciating the extent of the prevailing economic challenges and their dire impact on employee welfare and that of other citizens.
The doctors might need to understand that the reason why there have been no strikes in the private sector for many years is actually not because workers in that sector are paid hefty US$ salaries.
As a matter of fact, the sole reason why there have been no strikes is that private sector workers have come to appreciate, most grudgingly, that their employers clearly lack the capacity to pay higher salaries amid the prevailing economic conditions.
In this connection, the doctors might want to appreciate too that scores of companies are failing to pay their workers for months but the workers in question are still coming to work daily and have not withdrawn their labour.
Furthermore, President Mnangagwa himself has taken a five percent salary cut as has done his two deputies, ministers and all senior civil servants, highlighting their support for the austerity measures the Government has adopted so as to rebuild the economy.
Another sad fact that our valued, hardworking junior doctors need to appreciate is that in this economy no worker is really as comfortable as they want, or as they deserve.
But as they appear to be determined to press on with their illegal job action, we are tempted to agree with some observations that the junior doctors are trying to blackmail the Government into granting them concessions that will prove unsustainable in the long run.
At the same time, we totally agree with Vice President Constantino Chiwenga that the junior doctors are negotiating in bad faith.
Bongani Ndlovu
Online Reporter