Uganda Medical Association President Dr Ekwaro Obuku has dismissed President Museveni’s threats on striking doctors as shear lack of touch with reality.
President Museveni while at a public rally in Burahya County in Kabarole District on Thursday threatened to sack all doctors involved in the now two weeks’ industrial action.
“I will not accept Ugandans to die, if doctors don’t want to work, I will sack them,” Museveni said before adding that the doctors are failing the NRM principle of managing scarce resources.
However, Dr Obuku says that should Museveni insist on firing the doctors, they will move to Kenya.
“Museveni will never find any other trained doctors like we have today. We doctors that have stayed here are patriots, should he fire us, we shall go to Kenya and he will lose us, that is the truth. Besides should any of the doctors run to court over that, it will attract huge legal costs,” Dr Obuku spoke to Nile Post exclusively.
He called upon the President to drop the threats citing that they will not work.
“The president says we will regret for striking, yes we are already regretting why we did not start the strike earlier,” Obuku said.
It should be noted that President Museveni is due to meet doctors tomorrow at State House Entebbe to chat a way forward regarding their demands. But Obuku casts the meeting in doubt.
“We are looking forward for the meeting tomorrow, but with these threats, it is likely not to happen,” he said.
He however said that the doctors are keen on meeting President Museveni so that they tell him the truth about what is going on in the health sector.
Obuku further claimed Museveni’s remarks in Kabarole only show that he is out of touch with reality.
“This is very unfortunate news from Museveni. He is ill advised. He fired health workers in a rally at Nakawuka, he surely did not have information according to the investigations we did,” Obuku said.
“Museveni talks about ten bottle necks which hinder Africa’s emancipation, among which he says is poor investment in human resource, that is what we are asking for but he is not doing,” he added.
