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Dr Parirenyatwa

Health Reporter
Government is re-examining the proposed new contracts for doctors following an outcry by the health workers. Health Services Board (HSB) communications executive Mr Nyasha Maravanyika said HSB’s legal department was re-working the contract in liaison with the Minister of Health and Child Care Dr David Parirenyatwa.

“The contract issue is being looked into by the Minister’s office, together with HSB’s legal department, and we hope it will soon be complete,” he said.

A new contract for junior doctors was introduced last month in a move aimed at discouraging interns from taking part in industrial action.

The initially proposed contract provided Government with the right to withhold payment of interns should they fail to report for duty over a month, or reduce payments depending on the number of days they were absent from work.

The contract stated that interns maybe paid an on-call allowance that may also be subject to review.

The contract denied female doctors maternity leave entitlements when they fall pregnant. Before the new contract proposal was made, junior doctors were entitled benefits just like senior doctors.

Through the Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association (ZDHA), the junior doctors refused to sign the contracts, which they said were draconian. Junior doctors are medical students on attachment.

Although the junior doctors have since assumed their roles in different health institutions in the country, they are yet to get their salaries, a situation ZDHA attributed to the contract deadlock.

The organisation’s president, Dr Fortune Nyamande, said: “The ZHDA, on behalf of our newly qualified doctors, calls upon the President (Mugabe) to direct the HSB to end this madness where our new doctors have not been remunerated for the past two months.

“We call upon the President (Mugabe) to also immediately investigate the authors of the proposed new contract for our new doctors, which the ZHDA has described as falling below any standard contract of employment, even those that used to guide slave-master relationships in the slave trade era.

“We believe the contract and those who are pushing for its implementation are doing so outside Cabinet knowledge and approval.”

Mr Maravanyika said there was no link between the delays in the doctors’ payments and the signing of the new contracts.

He said the delay in payment was due to delays in HSB getting concurrence from Treasury.

“Once we get the Treasury concurrence, they will be paid their salaries. It has nothing to do with signing of the new contracts,” he said.