Kwabena Mintah AkandohOne of the qualities of good leadership is an outstanding ability to manage situations under intense pressure.
Our Health Minister, Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, has not lived up to expectation as his conduct since the nurses’ strike commenced clearly shows.
His actions and utterances so far in the face of the biting strike show that he and his government could not care a hoot and would rather rubbish the concerns of the striking nurses. The nurses can go to hell as his posturing showed: government was going to bring in retired nurses to man the wards should not be the remarks of a health minister in the face of a crisis.
We recall a similar strike by doctors during the National Democratic Congress (NDC) regime when then President John Mahama announced that government was going to bring in some 170 Cuban doctors to deliver healthcare, a replacement for the striking Ghanaian health personnel.
We are appalled by the response to the strike by government, whose record of managing similar situations in the past trigger worries as to whether they would this time around respond differently and positively.
At the time of composing this leader, word has it that a court action was being considered to compel the nurses to return to the wards and consulting rooms.
Whatever it takes to have the nurses return to save lives is appreciated, although we would prefer that this is not done without incurring the wrath of the nurses. Working under duress, especially considering the situation of nurses, would not inure to the interest of patients.
The services of nurses who return to the wards and consulting rooms following the resolution of their concerns would be better than being compelled to do so.
Describing the strike as politically motivated as the NDC is doing is an unfortunate remark thrown into the works by the minister to weaken the resolve of the nurses.
We have noticed the singling out of Perpetual Ofori-Ampofo, President of the Ghana Registered Nurses and Midwives Association (GRNMA) for attack.
In the estimation of the NDC, she is only carrying out a political agenda for the main opposition party. This does not make sense especially when this same woman led the nurses’ front during the New Patriotic Party (NPP) regime to demand a better condition of service.
We are dealing with a very serious matter, health delivery belittling which, with such political undertones, would not be in our overall interest as a nation.
Under Akufo-Addo regime, COVID-19 struck and the Russian-Ukrainian war broke out with far-reaching repercussions on the global economy, yet a response was fashioned out which saved lives. As for the impact the response had on the national budget, it was abundantly clear. For the Health Minister to claim the subject was not captured in the budget and so cannot be considered sounds irresponsible.
We have observed how politically exposed NDC persons have sought to ridicule the nurses with assortment of invectives.
Nursing is a serious profession with laid-down processes such as passing prescribed examinations after a specified period of lectures and practicals.
Being professionals, they must write periodic examinations to be licensed to practice.
Those who embark on this path of ridiculing nurses the way we are witnessing are rather exposing their ignorance.
Nurses have diploma, degree and PhD holders in their ranks.
Let us upgrade ourselves with requisite knowledge before doing the bidding of politicians.
