This was a headline from the Swazi Times last Wednesday (article attached at the bottom). The nurses were striking because they had not received their overtime pay since the beginning of the year. Despite a judgement from the High Court stating that the nurses should return to work, the strike continued through Friday. In a country where the health care system is driven by nurses this sort of action has a huge impact. The community clinics are run strictly by nurses. This includes well child care, immunizations, prenatal care, sick visits and in some clinics ARV refills and initiations. The hospitals, while they do have doctors, were still severely crippled by the strike. While in the ART clinic last Friday at Mbabane Government Hospital, an admitted patient came down from the inpatient ward to the outpatient clinic to receive help because there was no one to help on the ward. Patients were backed up in the outpatient departments waiting to be seen by the few military/correctional nurses, who had been called in for emergency care.

Luckily the nurses were back at work on Monday. Unfortunately, this sort of action might be a recurring event. The government of Swaziland is facing a serious economic crisis. There are rumors of changes including possible salaries cuts for civil servants from the top to the bottom. It will be interesting to watch over the next few months the steps taken to combat this crisis and the local reaction to it.

NURSES SHUT DOWN ALL HOSPITALS

10 March, 2011 10:00:00By Faith Vilakati

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The Mbabane Government Hospital

THE nation is warned to take sick relatives to government hospitals and clinics at its own risk because nurses have engaged in a total shutdown strike starting from today.

This applies to all public health institutions in the country.The nurses will not be attending to any patients until further notice. By afternoon yesterday the walls of the Mbabane Government Hospital were ‘decorated’ with notices informing the nurses to down syringes and converged at the hospital conference room ‘to sit’.

This would be the situation until government pays them their protracted overtime allowances dating back to September last year. As to when government would pay them no one knows. However, in case it (government) decides to go to court to seek an interdict against the continuation of the strike then they (nurses) would have to abandon the strike in respect of that judgment. The nurses said because they were the essential services providers they knew for a fact that government would go to court to try and stop them from striking.

Meeting
They resolved this yesterday during their mass meeting at the Greater Alpha Restaurant, Manzini.
They were told that no one else but only their President Bheki Mamba would tell them when to go back to work and this would be only if government had either paid the money or went to court. Mamba explained to the over 300 nurses, who attended the meeting that they would have to respect a court order in the event government runs to court. “Once the court order is issued saying we must go back to work we will have no power to go against it and there is no argument on that,” he said.

Secretary General of the Swaziland Democratic Nurses Union (SWADNU) Sibusiso Lushaba told the nurses that shop stewards in the different regions would make logistics on where they (nurses) would be during the strike action.

He explained that it would be better for them to be at their work premises so that they could be monitored by their leaders while the national executive committee (NEC) monitored its progress at national level.

“We plead for cooperation from all the nurses in the different hospitals and clinics. This action is for a good cause, so, we need each other’s support to meet our goal. Without support we will not get our money,” he said.

This resolution came two days after the nurses were engaged in a protest march and delivered a petition on the allowances to the ministry of health. The two-day march was a fulfillment of a resolution taken by the nurses during their congress meeting held last month in Siteki. During the congress it was agreed that the nurses would take to the streets every week for two days (Monday and Tuesday).

Distributed
Yesterday it was revealed during the meeting that there were some few cheques that had already been distributed but the nurses were warned against taking them until all of them (nurses) received the money. While other nurses announced that the cheques were received others said they gathered that they were bouncing in the different banks because they were post dated.

Neither the Minister of Health Bennedict Xaba nor his Principal Secretary wanted to comment on the matter. They both said they did not have comments when contacted late in the afternoon yesterday.
However, by 6:30pm the minister was still in a meeting with NEC in his offices and it could not be gathered what transpired during that meeting.

Call for nation’s support in strike

NURSES have asked members of the public to support them in the strike action. Sibusiso Lushaba, Secretary General of the Swaziland Democratic Nurses Association (SWADNU), said the support could be by forcing government to pay them their money or demand answers on the situation.
He said through the strike action they were not trying to hurt them (patients) because they knew that they were innocent but were pushed to do this by the unfaithfulness of the government they voted for.
He said it was unfortunate that during such actions the innocent members of the public were greatly affected because they used government hospitals when sick as they could not afford the private hospitals’ fees. Lushaba said as nurses they understood the impact the strike would have on the public but they had no alternative because they were hungry.

He pleaded with the nation, mainly people who have sick relatives admitted in different hospitals to be patient as they (nurses) tried to ‘nurse’ the situation. “We have been patient for a long time now and during all this time, government has been promising us heaven and earth and when it is time to deliver, it fails. We cannot take it anymore. All that we as nurses want now is the money we deserve because we have worked for it,” he said.

In November last year government signed a collective agreement with the nurses that it would pay them their allowances in January but when the time for that came government asked them to be patient until the following month. In February government sang the same chorus.

NEC fails to convince nurses against strike

THE National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Swaziland Democratic Nurses Association (SWADNU) saw red when nurses blamed them for resolving they engage in a work to rule strike instead of a total shut down. Different nurses, about 10, who spoke after their President Bheki Mamba had announced this, stated clearly that the NEC was out of order in this regard.
The NEC took the resolution that they engage in the work to rule during a caucus meeting they held for over 30 minutes outside the conference room. Mamba explained to the nurses that they came to this resolution after putting into consideration that they were not demanding salary adjustments but overtime allowances.

“So, we noted that it would not be right for us to engage in a total shut-down as almost all of you want rather we not work the overtime. I would also ask that you give us time to tell our employer that we have engaged another gear which means that you will not start the strike action today or tomorrow as we have planned to meet government tomorrow,” he said.

The nurses shouted against that telling the NEC that it was either they engaged in a total shutdown or they went to work. They also ordered the NEC to tell government of their resolution immediately after the meeting because they were not ready for more government stunts. It was suggested that the nurses vote for what they wanted and almost all of them voted for the idea of the total shutdown while only two nurses suggested that they engage on the work to rule strike action.

The two nurses who raised their hands against the total shutdown were booed by the whole house.
This resulted in the NEC having no choice but to announce a total shut-down in all hospitals.
One of the nurses only identified as Ndzimandze, who was the first one to make submissions after the announcement of the NEC’s resolution, said the work to rule strike action was less effective compared to the complete shutdown.