• Petition Lagos Assembly

WORKERS at the Primary Health Care Department of the Lagos State Local Government Services have petition the state House of Assembly over alleged faulty implementation of health reform law and “overbearing attitude” of the Special Adviser (SA) to the governor on public Health.

The workers, in a petition titled: ‘Dysfunctional implementation of the Lagos State Health Sector Reform Law,’ urged the lawmakers to look into the running and implementation of the PHC Board vis-à-vis its management and financial activities.

In their letter read on the floor of the Assembly, the PHC workers, consisting of Nurses, Pharmacists, and Health Workers among others, noted that the enactment of the reform law in 2008 and establishment of PHC Board had raised fresh hope among the workers that health service delivery to the people would be more effective.

The PHC Board, according to them, had set out to implement the reform law appropriately until the current SA to the governor was appointed into the Ministry of Health in 2011.

Since then, “staff of the PHC department have found no peace with the SA’s overbearing attitudes. Rather than allow the PHC Board to function in line with the law establishing it, she has arrogated to herself the powers and day-to-day running of the Public health care system like a private organisation.

“Since her appointment, the SA has not added any value to the PHC system. The only achievement recorded by her in the last two years has been chaos and disillusionment. Her popular statement is “I have the mandate of the governor to step on your heads, and I careless about whose ox is gored.

“This statement lack decorum and can never be in the interest of the state public service,” the statement read in part.

The petitioners added that they had written several letters to the governor but to no avail, hence their resolve to turn to the House of Assembly to “save our soul”.

Reacting to the petition, lawmaker representing Lagos Island I, Wahab Alawiye-King, informed the House that there are rules guiding employee-employer relationships in the state, and the state Ministry of Health couldn’t be an exception.