The Saudi recruitment of Nigerian doctors

RECENTLY, the Saudi Arabian authorities arranged a recruitment exercise for Nigerian medical doctors in Abuja. Like the rest of the world, Nigeria is still battling the devastating global pandemic,  COVID-19, and it cannot but be concerning that Nigerian doctors and consultants trooped out into the venue in droves. The healthcare professionals were apparently eager to escape from the misery in which they had been ensnared for years, but the vast majority of Nigerians who look up to them for medical care have been left in the lurch as it were. To worsen matters, there is a subsisting industrial face-off between the government and resident doctors in public hospitals in the country over their conditions of service.

The recruitment exercise in question invariably came to be publicly perceived as ironic: here were cheated, unappreciated medical doctors in Nigeria being recruited by a more appreciative country while Nigerians were languishing in hospital beds, crying for medical attention. While the recruitment exercise was going on, the Nigerian government had only been able to secure an ex-parte ruling against the resident doctors aimed at maintaining the status quo in the industrial action. Instructively, last week, medical doctors already recruited by the Saudi Arabian government and the governments of other countries reportedly expressed joy at their reversal of fortune. Speaking against the backdrop of last week’s recruitment exercise in Abuja, the doctors related their pleasant experiences in their new work environment. They spoke of the comparatively less workload, superb working conditions and decent remuneration that had been on offer.  Their working conditions are indubitably top notch and they are enjoying a new lease of life.

Curiously, both the Health and Labour ministers in Nigeria today are medical doctors who have failed woefully to reform the health sector and ease its pains. On the contrary, they have been rather acerbic and condescending in their style of negotiation with the doctors. The Minister of Labour and Productivity, Dr. Chris Ngige, for instance once remarked that at the ratio of 1 to 3,500, the supply of doctors in the country was rather surplus. This is, to say the very least, a most unfortunate remark. On his part, the Minister of Health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire, spoke of importing foreign medical doctors rather than focusing on the improvement of the Nigerian doctors’ conditions of service. It is not hard to surmise that these condescending stances are impacting negatively on the relationship between the government and the doctors and consultants.

It is really hard to imagine that for reasons of ego trip, locally trained medical doctors will be treated shabbily by their own professional colleagues, namely the two ministers. The lackadaisical and desultory attitudes of the ministers during negotiations have worsened matters and only a change of tactics can offer a redress. Besides, Nigeria got it wrong constitutionally when it allowed individuals who have dual citizenship to hold public office and leadership positions. It bodes ill for the country when such people consistently refer to the country which they superintend over in the third person and out of lack of commitment. Although mobility of labour is universally accepted by the liberal world, the recent massive recruitment exercise for Nigerian doctors by the Saudi Arabian government, especially  coming on the heels of a global pandemic and  local industrial action, is an indictment on the country’s political leadership. This, of course, is the prevailing situation only because the country’s leaders have chosen to enjoy medical treatment abroad rather than here in the country. They feel no need to upgrade the country’s hospitals because they really do not need them on a personal level.

The country’s president goes in and out of London hospitals and so do governors and other members of the political class who are regular visitors to hospitals abroad. A country’s political leaders are ideally supposed to access medical care locally. They are supposed to be products of the country’s education system, of which the health sector is a vital part. They are supposed to contribute substantially and significantly to the university teaching hospitals and other institutions of medical research and practice. They are supposed to lead by example, harnessing local and foreign talents for growth and development in the sector. Sadly, that is not the case in Nigeria where political leaders pay lip service to the health sector.  One sad corollary of the recruitment of Nigerian doctors by foreign countries is that the country loses out after expending considerable cost in training them. It takes a lot of training and experience to become a consultant, but the available few are being mopped up by the governments of serious countries who value the lives of their citizens.

We urge the government to address the demands of workers in the health sector. It must make the sector attractive. The brain drain being experienced on a regular basis is putting the lives of ordinary Nigerians in danger. It is more cost-effective to pay Nigerian doctors well than to pay through the nose to be treated by them abroad. The government must go back to the drawing board.

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