BREAKING: Health Workers In Anambra Disappointed With Soludo’s No Solution Embarks On Strike Over His Incapacitations – SIXT-MEDIA LANE
BREAKING: Health workers in Anambra embark on another industrial action laid at the feet of an indifferent Soludo APGA government.
Today, health workers in Anambra State have joined a growing pattern of industrial actions across the state’s health sector the latest escalation in a dispute that the state government has repeatedly failed to resolve. This is not an isolated protest; it is the predictable result of years of broken promises, unpaid entitlements and the refusal to implement nationally-approved pay structures for health personnel.
What happened (verified facts & timeline)
Health sector unions in Anambra issued an ultimatum and repeatedly warned the state government in early September, saying they would withdraw services if demands were not met. Reports in September show unions set firm strike dates if their demands were not implemented.
On September 11, resident doctors at Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University Teaching Hospital (COOUTH), Awka, commenced a seven-day warning strike to press specific demands including payment of the Medical Residency Training Fund (MRTF) and outstanding allowances. That action followed “several failed efforts” to get the government to pay the MRTF and other entitlements.
Earlier in the month health workers warned of an indefinite shutdown over Anambra’s refusal to implement the federal salary structure for health workers that many other states have adopted the unions argued the approved 2010 salary framework has not been implemented in Anambra. Reports warned that up to 15,000 patients could be put at risk if services were withdrawn.
The human cost
Reports warned that a full withdrawal of services could endanger thousands of patients, mothers, children, emergency cases and chronic patients whose care depends on functioning public facilities. Yet the Soludo APGA government has paid deaf ear to this implications. Media coverage in September explicitly flagged that tens of thousands of patients could be affected by a statewide action.
Resident doctors themselves cited drastic staff shortages and overwork caused by unpaid allowances and unresolved welfare issues. Those shortages increase clinical risk and force families to scramble for private care they cannot afford.
Why this is the Soludo government’s failure.
1. Broken promises and piecemeal responses. Health workers say the government promised implementation of the MRTF and other entitlements earlier in the year but has repeatedly failed to deliver forcing unions back into the streets and into strike action. The resident doctors’ communique states the strike followed several failed efforts to engage the state government.
2. Refusal to adopt an agreed national standard. The salary structure for health workers (approved at the federal level and adopted by many states) remains unimplemented in Anambra under Soludo, meaning health staff are paid less than peers in neighbouring states despite doing the same work. That is a direct driver of staff attrition and strikes.
3. Recruitment and staffing failures. Multiple reports document a shortage of doctors and other clinical staff at teaching and state hospitals; the government’s failure to recruit to recommended staffing levels leaves the remaining workers overworked and increases risk for patients.
4. Reactive, not preventive governance. Soludo government has repeatedly been forced to scramble only after unions issued ultimatums negotiations are episodic and stop gap, not structural reforms. That cyclical “pay-off-and-forget” approach has failed to produce durable solutions.
This is not merely another headline; it is an unfolding public health emergency created by Soludo policy neglect. When health workers are unpaid, overworked, and ignored the people who pay the highest price are ordinary Anambra families. The Soludo APGA government must stop treating healthcare as a bargaining chip and deliver concrete, verifiable action now.
No wonder the wife hunted she can’t trust any hospital in the state for her health or that if her family.
IT’S BROKEN! OUR HEALTH SECTOR IS BROKEN DOWN COMPLETELY
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