Eighty-two general nurse graduates of the Holy Family Nurses Training College in Nkawkaw have petitioned the Ministry of Health (MoH) over their exclusion in the list of financial clearance by government to pave way for health workers enrolment into the various government health institutions.
The petition, addressed to the minister, Alex Segbefia, indicated that the nurses are part of those bonded by government and, they were, therefore, supposed to have been employed after completion of their studies.
However, they are yet to be employed two years after completing their education as they were mistakenly deleted from the list of students submitted for financial clearance.
“Honourable minister, the group is unhappy about how we were left out in the 2016 recruitment of bonded nurses,” they said.
According to the group, preliminary and subsequent follow-ups to aforementioned body left them in doubt as their alma mater was erroneously classified as a private institution, hence the deletion of their names.
“As nurses who are trained in serving our nation, we find it deeply worrying that an avoidable error was made. It should be noted that our colleagues from other schools gained financial clearance have been posted and have started working,” they disclosed.
They said their monthly allowance that they were depending on ceased immediately after national service, making it difficult to meet the demands of their daily upkeep and have become burdens to our parents.
The general nurses indicated that they have the skills to work and, therefore, must be given the opportunity as bonded unposted nurses to work.
“We are only crying for survival, our families need our supports, our patients and our motherland Ghana needs our services,” they said.
The group per the petition asked the ministry to facilitate the financial clearance of the affected general nurses to enable their onward recruitment in July 2016 without any delay since their colleagues in the same category have been cleared and posted.
“The group believes that as a listening minister, you will listen to our plea and ensure that our demands are met .We believe in your message, ‘Changing lives’ and that our lives deserve to be changed,” they hinted.
By Jamila Akweley Okertchiri