Angelah Nothando Mlotshwa
President Emmerson Mnangagwa has signed into law the Health Services Bill which takes away the rights for public sector health workers to go on strike.
The new law criminalises any industrial job action which goes beyond 72 hours, and any member of the Health Service who breaches the Act shall be liable for a fine and a prison sentence not exceeding six months or both.
According to the new Health Service Amendment Act 2022, public health employees will still be expected to work even during the time they are on strike.
“Notwithstanding anything in the Labour Act (Chapter 28:01): the Health Service shall be deemed as an essential service referred to in section 65(3) of the constitution; and no collective job action, whether lawful or unlawful, shall continue for an uninterrupted period of 72 hours or for more than 72 hours in any given 14-days; and notice of any collective job action must be given in writing 48 hours prior to the commencement of such collective job action,” reads the statement.
“Any individual who is a member of the governing body of any trade union representative body of members of the health service which incites or organises any collective job action contrary to subsection (2)(b) or (c) shall be guilty of any an offense and liable to a fine not exceeding level 4 or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding six months or both such fine and imprisonment.”, reads the statement.
It also says, “A member of the Health Service is under obligation, whilst employed by the Commission shall provide all necessary skills, expertise, care and service expected of him or her as a member of the profession to which he or she belongs; and “during any collective job action, to provide the skill, expertise, care and service to patients in a medical emergency or needing critical care.
ZIM GBC NEWS engaged nurses representatives on the subject and they said the following:
“Our position as Zimbabwe Young Nurses association is that Nursing is a calling and we should put our patients first then the rest follows, however, when it comes to grievances, no matter what, dialogue
with the employer should be in progress before any industrial action to avoid putting our patients’ lives at risk because if a patient‘s life is lost during a strike, their life will never be recovered even if the triggering factor is resolved. Moreover, strikes will never take our country forward ,they are the major sources of destruction to our nation .As health care workers ,we need to join our hands together. Let’s all have progressive minds. All health workers are the pillars of life so in this case we should not leave any patient unattended”, said the Zimbabwe Young Nurses Association Chairperson(ZiYNA) Cynthia Chisiri.
“When someone chooses to be a nurse, they should be pushed by passion to save lives. You can’t get trained by the government for free, put in hospital to save life, then you abandon the patients dying because of any reason. It’s better not to do nursing if you prioritize money over human life. Yes as Health professionals we need money to survive, at the same time someone’s relative in hospital should not be left to die in pain due to any reason”, said Ganizani Phiri Vice President for Health Ambassadors for Economic Development.