GMA to hold General Assembly on Friday to decide on threat to resign en masse

Striking doctors of the Ghana Medical Association will be holding a general assembly on Friday to decide on whether to resign en masse or not. 

The doctors at public health institutions have abandoned the wards and withdrawn from all emergency services over their conditions of service. 

A statement signed by leading members Dr Kwabena Opoku-Adusei and Dr Frank Serebour at the end of the 4th National Executive Council meeting of the Ghana Medical Association in Koforidua said the council is mindful of the various developments including appeals by various groups in the country and has therefore decided that an Extra Ordinary General Assembly be held to review the situation. 

<b>Report</b>

  
According to the GMA, it submitted its proposal to a government joint negotiation team made up of its members and the government. 

It says the ground rules for the Committee were signed between the parties on the 28th of June, 2015 and in response to the progress made, the GMA called for an Extra-Ordinary General Meeting to review its deadline to the 29th of July to give room for negotiations to continue. 

As part of the rules, both parties were prohibited from making public, any document from the negotiation table. 

It was against this background that it submitted its proposals to government. But throughout the process of negotiations, the association claims government position kept on changing from time to time. 

It therefore had no option than to roll out the road-map on the 29th of July 2015, when no Conditions of Service Document had been negotiated and signed as was demanded by the General Assembly of the GMA. 

It says when the road-map eventually came into force, the government resulted to propaganda with the aim of swaying public opinion against the doctors despite the fact that it was the government that had not shown good faith at the negotiation table and went to the extent of leaking to the press, proposals that the GMA had put before it at the negotiation table in clear violation of the ground rules that were signed between the parties. 

Subsequently, it claims several altered documents were also released into the public domain to make it appear as if government was making concessions but it was the GMA that was being recalcitrant. 

The development according to the association worsened when government put forward a take-it-or-leave-it proposal to it which contained worse proposals compared to government’s previous position. 

It says it then became clear to the Association that government had taken an entrenched position and was not ready to find solutions to the impasse. 

But it says it nevertheless engaged the Ghana Health Service Council and on two occasions had meetings with the Parliamentary Select Committee on Health with the aim of making progress with the negotiations. 

Despite the efforts, it says government continues to complicate the situation by misrepresenting the facts. 

A situation the GMA says emboldens it to press home their legitimate demands. 

However, the association says its National Executive Council, mindful of the various developments including appeals by various groups in the country, has taken the decision that an Extra Ordinary General Assembly meeting be held on Friday, 14th August, 2015 to review the situation. 

In the light of this, the GMA calls on all of its members to remain calm and steadfast in these turbulent times. 

It however condemns in no uncertain terms, the recent phenomenon where heads of training institutions at the least provocation threaten and or release house officers to the Medical and Dental Council for reposting. 

It says the act amounts to intimidation and an infringement on the rights of house officers to participate in trade union activities, a right which is enshrined in the Labour Act 651. 

It admonishes Heads of all health facilities to stop the practice with immediate effect. 

The association reminds its members that the current action however difficult is aimed at finding long term solutions towards labour relations and improve on efficiency and quality care in the health sector.

GBC