The governor directed the Ministry of Health in the state to immediately advertise vacancies for the replacement of the dismissed nurses.
Kaduna State has been grounded in the last 48 hours as aviation workers, bank workers, rail workers, electricity workers, health workers, teachers, amongst others, down tools in protest against the alleged injustice of the El-Rufai-led government and the mass sacking of over 60,000 civil servants.
However, the Governor in a statement on Tuesday titled, ‘KDSG will not tolerate criminal acts disguised as industrial action’, described the action of the NLC as a “campaign of economic and social sabotage and lawlessness”.
In the statement signed by the governor’s Special Adviser on Media and Communication, Muyiwa Adekeye, El-Rufai warned that any worker not found in his or her place of assignment would be dismiss.
The statement stated, “The Ministry of Health will dismiss all nurses below GL 14 for going on an unlawful strike. Salaries that could have gone to them are to be given as extraordinary occupational allowances to the health workers who are at their duty posts to fill the gap of those absconding from duty. The Ministry of Health has been directed to advertise vacancies for the immediate recruitment of new nurses to replace those dismissed.
“Any academic staff of KASU (Kaduna State University) that does not report for work will be dismissed. The authorities of KASU are to submit a copy of the attendance register for all categories of staff daily to the Secretary to the State Governemnt and the Commissioner of Education.”
The governor, in a statement said, “KDSG (Kaduna State Government) views NLC actions as the mob equivalent of bandits that are kidnapping and menacing our citizens. Bandits illegally use arms, but the NLC’s mob action is for similar ends: to hold hostage freedoms, economic interests, livelihoods and resources of the people of Kaduna State.
“Efforts to dress up criminal activity as industrial action do not change the reality of lawbreaking that has unfolded, including their persistently ignoring the prohibition against impeding essential services.
“Also, KDSG cannot ignore the illegal pressures brought to disrupt the operations of banks and other private business whose staff and customers do not have any industrial dispute with the state or any other government.”