Ilorin: Doctors Commence Five-Day Strike Over Assault Of Colleague

The Association of Resident Doctors (ARD), University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital (UITH) chapter has begun a five-day strike to protest the assault and beating of a doctor by relatives of a deceased patient on Wednesday.

The hospital management seized the corpse and arrested one of the victim’s sons, Mustapha Saliu for allegedly partaking in the assault of the doctor.

The doctors, who sang solidarity songs while the protest lasted on Friday, called for security protection from further occurrence.

Placards were carried with various inscriptions on them which include, “ARD says no to violence”, “health workers' lives matter” and “protect us as we protect you”.

Addressing newsmen during the protest, the President of ARD-UITH, Dr Mubaraq Ijaiya, said the strike was “total”, adding that doctors demanded the presence of armed security personnel at all emergency points within the hospital for the safety of their lives.

He said, “This is one of several episodes of physical assault on members this year with no culprit prosecuted to a logical conclusion and several other assaults that have occurred on health care workers in the last few months within the hospital”.

Speaking on the Wednesday incident, Ijaiya said the patient was a known individual in the facility being managed for a terminal illness.

“He was rushed to the emergency unit of the hospital on December 27th at about 7:00 am. He was promptly attended to and admitted for emergency management by the medical team on emergency duty.

“The necessary management plan was prescribed including some required investigations and his primary managing team was notified through a written consult and phone call, ” he said.

Ijaiya further explained that contrary to information making the rounds, the patient was alive and was just stabilized by the same doctor when the relatives assaulted him.

He added, “unfortunately despite the best efforts of the managing team, the patient passed away in the early hours of Thursday”.