NURSES at Marondera Provincial Hospital have defied government’s directive to cancel flexi hours.
BY JAIROS SAUNYAMA
On Monday, the nurses held a meeting at the institution where it was resolved that they will honour the bipartite negotiating forum agreement that was passed early this year.
However, in a memo dated April 20 and signed by the provincial medical director (PMD) Simukai Zizhou, government cancelled the arrangement and ordered all nurses to report back to work.
Government claimed that there was need for enough manpower to deal with a possible increase in COVID-19 cases, hence the cancellation of flexi hours.
When NewsDay visited the hospital, nurses were gathered in the foyer to discuss the way forward before they agreed to ignore the directive while others proposed an industrial action.
Zimbabwe Nurses Association boss Enoch Dongo confirmed the nurses’ meeting and said they would not honour the directive.
“They met, they are now back at work after some discussion. We are not going to allow the PMD to change what was agreed before. He has no mandate, it is beyond him to cancel the flexible working hours. It is a baby of the bipartite negotiating forum, we discussed and agreed with the employer and we have a collective bargaining agreement with the government, which is a legal document that cannot be cancelled at that level,” he said.
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Their agreement with government was that nurses would work two days a week after they had complained of poor salaries.
