General Secretary of the Ghana Registered Nurses and Midwifery Association (GRNMA), David Tenkorang has registered dissatisfaction over the government’s agreement with the UK government for the transfer of Ghanaian nurses to work in the UK.
The Health Minister, Kwaku Agyemang Manu on Monday, December 5 revealed an imminent bilateral agreement between the Government of Ghana and the British Government to send Ghanaian trained Nurses to the United Kingdom (UK) in exchange for financial considerations.
According to Mr Agyemang Manu, this will be similar to an already existing arrangement with Barbados, where he said Ghanaian nurses are excelling.
However, David Tenkorang in an interview with Samuel Eshun on the Happy Morning Show argued that Ghanaian nurses are best needed in the country to augment the government’s “Agenda 111” flagship programme.
He noted, “It’s not easy as we see it because we as Ghanaians also need the nurses here in our country. Looking at the Agenda 111 programme after the process of it all, we will need the assignments of our very own nurses.We can’t dispute to the decision of the health minister, making arrangements in sending our nurses to the UK, but also, our country needs our very own nurses.”
He charged the government to consider an increase in salary and introducing some incentives to improve the living conditions of nurses rather than transfer them to other countries for financial aid.
“The government should be generous in paying our nurses very well so that they will find it easy to stay in Ghana and continue to provide their services to the nation. Should it be that, we send them away and unfortunately we discover another airborne diseases like the Covid 19, we will suffer as a country,” he said.
He furthered, “I don’t have any problem with the president sending our nurses away but we need to systematized it very well so that it will protect us in such a way that some of the nurses will remain and provide services to Ghanaians.”
By: Brigit Onyinah
