As members of the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD), the University of Benin Teaching Hospital UBTH) joined their counterparts across the country to embark on a warning strike; scores of patients who visited the hospital on Monday were turned back.
Many of the patients who were turned back were those who had yesterday as their doctor’s appointment date, and many of them had travelled to Benin from different locations within and outside Edo State.
The ARD, it would be recalled, had declared a seven-day warning strike over the abduction of their colleague, Dr Ganiyat Popoola, who was kidnapped about eight months ago in Kaduna.
Popoola, a senior registrar in the Department of Ophthalmology, National Eye Centre, Kaduna, was abducted on December 27, 2023, alongside her husband and nephew. However, her husband was released by their abductors in March 2024, while Popoola and her nephew have remained in captivity.
The president of NARD, Dr Dele Abdullahi, declared the warning strike, which began at midnight on August 26, would be “total. There will be no concessions; there will be no emergency care.”
One of the patients who were turned back at the UBTH yesterday, who identified herself as Felicia, expressed dismay over the development
Felicia, who said she travelled several kilometres to honour an appointment with her doctor, added that she defied the early morning downpour to find her way to the hospital only to be turned back.
“I wasted my time and over N3,000 transport to and fro the hospital. I defied the early morning downpour only to be turned back.” She lamented.
Before the Monday warning strike, members of the NARD held protest rallies in all tertiary institutions across the country, calling for Popoola’s unconditional release, but to no avail.
