The Ondo State Government has said that the suspension of Residency program at the University of Medical Sciences Teaching Hospital does not amount to sacking of medical doctors.
It said issues that led to the strike action by the Doctors under the Residency Programme and the reprimand by the Management of UNIMED Teaching Hospital were currently being looked into and would be resolved on Monday.
Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Donald Ojogo, in a press statement issued yesterday evening said it was purely administrative and professional issue attracting a desirable attention and must not be politicised in any form.
Ojogo stated that there at no time did the state government sack doctors as the public was being made to erroneously believe.
He noted that the UNIMED Residency arrangement was the first since the establishment of the nation’s premier medical university.
According to him, “it is mostly undertaken by the federal government as many states do not find financial space for such.
“Nonetheless, it is pertinent to clarify that there is a wide difference between doctors employed by the state government and those under a residency programme. The residency is a Post Graduate Programme usually sponsored by Governments even as such beneficiaries render services for a specific period.
” In effect, Doctors under the Residency Programme are more or less, temporary Staff members who qualify as Consultants after their period of training.”