PLSG APPROVES RECRUITMENT OF CRITICAL STAFFERS FOR PSSH & PSHMB – DR GOLWA

...STRUCTURES NEED COMPLETING

...ORTHOPEDIC HOSPITAL SITE INSPECTED.

The Publishers of the NewsGate Magazine, Newscrest Newspaper, The Age Newspaper and the Reporter of the Nigeria Standard in a media parely spoke to Dr Filimon Habila Golwa, the Chief Medical Director of the Plateau State Specialist Hospital in his Jos office on the strike embarked upon by the staff of the Hospital and the Hospital Management Board and other related issues. He bared his mind.

Enjoy the Excerpts:

The Age Newspaper: For the benefit of our readers, may we know you?

Dr. Golwa: My name is Doctor Filimone Golwa, the Chief Medical Director Plateau Specialist Hospital,Jos.

The Age Newspaper: The Plateau State Specialist Hospital  and the Plateau State Hospitals Management Board are on strike for a while and you've just resumed, what led to the strike and why did you resume?

Dr. Golwa: Right before now, if you can remember, we have embarked on strike before, sometimes in February 2022, and we have earmarked on strikes few times concerning the requirements of the tertiary hospital. 

One of the major thing is that the man power need are falling so short of the expected requirements, and then the second thing was concerning the real status of the Specialist Hospital after it was accented to be a Specialist Hospital and gazetted. The third component basically was salaries. So these were the basic issues that were raised in the last time. So labour felt government has not responded in good time enough and it has delayed all those, so they simply continued on that suspended strike.In fact for me, I was not even privy to the discussion I only saw a copy of their draft that was sent to the office of the Head of Civil Service but mine was a photocopy. But all the same, I made frantic effort to have a dialogue with them. I have told them times without number that there is nothing that goes outside dialogue.But  because you are managing people and all of a sudden, you just dashed the person's hope on a strike and I thought doing that kind of a thing is not really too good, but they made me to understand that they are all fighting for the benefit of the hospital. So I quickly ran to the office of the Head of Civil Service and he quickly arranged for a meeting with the union members but they couldn't agree so that was why they had to continue with the strike but at the same time, government went and had dialogue several times including the Commissioner of Health for them to try and understand. So it was just last week that they had to put government to commitment, in terms of MoU.During that MoU signing, everything was agreed  that we are going to look into salary diffentials and the government has approved the memo we have earlier sent for the replacement of staff that are exiting the system.So based on that, they don't really have much reasons again to continue on the strike and that was why they had to call off the strike.

Before now, we have written to government about the exiting staff and the Governor graciously signed the same number. So with those convincing commitment of government, nobody has any good reason to continue with the strike and I think that was why they called off the sttike. You can see we are trying to build up the place again make the environment look neat and then try to clean every place. The first day, we had to do fumigation in the whole of the hospital environment.We had to source some people who help cut grasses as their own job including our own people who are also doing the same job and so you can see the place is a bid rousy and thanks be to God this morning everything is quite calm.We are doing our best to ensure everything is back to normal.

The Age Newspaper: Sir before now, there was this part of the hospital that is dilapidated that almost cause strike, has the Governor also agree to heed to the reconstructions of the dilapidated buildings and wards?

Dr. Golwa: Well, most of these issues that are structurally, government has fix everything.

 The key message was the manpower need which has been met,the next issue to fix is the structure.Also you need to get requisite manpower to be able to man the place and I think government has done its best. 

This morning my attention was drawn towards the mortuary. You have seen the face of the mortuary is not looking too good, so I have contacted the expert. The person that you just saw him went out now is all the way from Lagos.He is a reknown biomedical engineer, so he has embarked on a reconstruction of the whole of the mortuary cabinet and he has done all except one. One of the generators of that component was not very good, so he had to go to Lagos to bring it. He just came back from Lagos because we have two big corpses that are supposed to leave the mortuary within this week and I have given him a marching order to make sure it is done before Friday that's why you see him running up and down. I strongly believe that when the staff have settled down, every component of the service system will be fully restored.

The Age Newspaper: Sir I learnt of the issue of the non remittance of the Cooperative Society Fund of the civil servants, has it been addressed?

Dr. Golwa: You know, it is expected that as a civil servant I should work and you need to prepare for your terminal exit. So the purpose of Multipurpose Cooperative Society (MCS) came on board and almost every staff is registered to the MCS system including my very self. What is happening is that out of your salary you can make some savings out of it and then you carried that to the bank and there are people who managed that account. So this deduction that were made over time in the last four or five months, government didn't remit back,that was one of their grievances but again, government has graciously paid back most of it.I am not sure how many months left but believe me government has paid most of it. 

The Age Newspaper: Sir as the CMD of this hospital, are there areas or issues that are still pending that you feel you should advice government to look into, before it gets out of hand again like this other one?

Dr. Golwa: Well, the basic issues that are really pending are structural. You can look around and you can see those two big gigantic structures and it is everybody's prayer and wish that these structures are completed before the expiration of this administration. 

The Governor has promised in the past that he will definitely complete the structures before he leaves. So I still pray and I just believe that God will help so that our hopes will be translated to terms of expectations.

The Age Newspaper: How do you see the approval by the Plateau State Government to recruit more staff to replace those who have disengaged their services from the Plateau Specialist Hospital?

Dr. Golwa: Well, I think it is like a stimulus for a better function, for better results, for quality services, that is what we are expecting. You don't expect a staff to come in the night to see only one staff controlling a ward. This time around, atleast we will be able to have three or four staff that will come so that you don't have all those laxities on the management of the patients.

The Age Newspaper: Sir, Monkey Pox is now a global issue, how prepared is Plateau Specialist Hospital in this light?

Dr. Golwa: Well, we have a special department that controls all epidemics, including Covid-19, and if you look carefully, we had technically have a Covid 19 section and so Monkey Pox is not different from the other epidemics that we had over time.You remember Ebola and then much later, Lassa. Lassa is still on-going and then we have Covid 19, so Monkey Pox is not a very big deal.In fact, we are so much used now to the system.We know how we can curb any eventuality of epidemic or pandemic.

The Minister of Health is working assidously to really look for funding, because in the state, about one month ago, we had Five cases.

The Age Newspaper: Lastly sir,speaking on the Orthopedic Hospital approved by the Federal Government to Plateau state, we learnt within the week that some officers from Abuja came to inspect facilities. What do you have to say about the citing?

Dr. Golwa: Well, is so difficult to say because that is a policy thing. Government from the Ministry of Health too are working asidously to  really get a better location that will fit the National Orthopedic Hospital site in Plateau State.