Adamant nurses continue to protest

As the Punjab government failed to reach an agreement with the nurses asking for a pay raise and promotions, they continued their protest for the second day on Friday with even greater vigour and discipline despite being brutally roughed up by police a day earlier and cases filed against them for protesting on The Mall, which the government had recently outlawed.The Punjab government, seemingly taken aback by the magnitude of the protests and strikes in hospitals, tried to resolve the matter with the nurses and told them a committee headed by Law Minister Rana Sanaullah would meet their representatives to discuss the improved salary package, while Parliamentary Secretary for Health Dr Saeed Elahi also held talks with the protesting nurses and assured them that their concerns would be addressed. Reluctant to believe in mere assurances, however, the nurses announced that they would put off protest demonstrations but would continue their strike in hospitals across the province.
The nurses marched towards Chief Minister’s House earlier in the day and later gathered at Lahore Press Club, where they stayed until late in the evening. Some 300 nurses from hospitals in Lahore, Faisalabad, Multan, Dera Ghazi Khan and Bahawalpur made their presence felt, causing traffic jams in the area by protesting from midday to 5pm.
Meanwhile, a 14-member delegation of nurses comprising representatives of various hospitals met the parliamentary secretary and officials of the Health Department in Director General Nursing Office, where Dr Elahi assured them their valid demands would be addressed and ordered a meeting of the Departmental Promotion Committee in 15 days to consider the promotion of nurses.
The parliamentary secretary also discussed concerns of the nurses regarding promotion on the basis of seniority alone, and it was agreed between the government and the nurses that both qualification and seniority would be considered when promoting them to higher grades.
The nurses who had passed specialised courses would be considered for promotion to the next grade while those who had been serving for decades but had not passed the courses would be given a ‘moreover’, a representative of the nurses present at the meeting told Pakistan Today.
The nurses were also assured that the cases registered against them for protesting on The Mall would be rescinded.
Young Nurses Association President Razia Sultana told Pakistan Today that the nurses would continue their strike at the hospitals but would not come out onto the roads on Saturday (today). She said the nurses, despite being women, had taken to the roads and would not leave the protest without fulfillment of their demands. She said the nurses had met the officials several time before resorting to protests because their issues were not addressed. “This time, we will not believe in words. We want to see actions,” she said.