Casual workers at the Tamale West Hospital in the Northern region have threatened to embark on a strike, if management of the facility does not intervene to address the consistent delay in payment of the allowances.
The workers, who are merely cleaners and orderlies, said their action is necessitated by management’s decision to engage a waste management company to manage the orderlies at the facility.
One of the workers who spoke to Mynewsafric.com on condition of anonymity explained that, “five months ago management informed us they wanted to hand us over to the waste management company and we asked them why that decision since many of us have worked with the hospital for 11 and 12 years”.
“The medical superintendent assured as that we’ll still be under the Ghana Health Service and the hospital, the company was just to supervise our work so later that company told us to reapply and we also told them our management didn’t tell us that and we refused to apply”.
“So, for the first month, they delayed in paying us, we followed them like three weeks after the month had ended before they paid, it happened in the second and third months and we always complain to management. This month too they’re yet to pay so we have also decided not to work”.
Another worker lamented that “many of us here are without appointment letters but we have been working for more than 11 years and our pay is just Gh₵350 now they gave the contract to the company and now when the month ends, they don’t even want to pay us”.
He questioned why management still had the contract with the waste management company since they had reported severally to the management about the ineffectiveness of the company.
The workers threatened they will lay-down their tools if management is unable to cancel the contract and revert to the old system where they were paid and supervised by the hospital management.
Meanwhile, efforts to reach management of the Tamale West Hospital for a response were unsuccessful.
