Mozambique: Healthcare workers suspend strike, give government until Thursday

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Mozambique: Healthcare workers suspend strike, give government until Thursday

8:02 CAT | 01 Apr 2025

File photo: DW

The Association of United and Solidarity Health Professionals of Mozambique (APSUSM) has called off the strike planned to start yesterday, after scheduling negotiations with the government for Thursday, warning that without results, the strike will go ahead immediately.

“We’re going to open this space for dialogue, but it’s only for a day, not to say a few hours. If they don’t come up with something concrete on 3 April, we’ll announce the specific dates [of the strike],” said Anselmo Muchave, president of APSUSM, accusing the government of “going round and round” in recent months with the demands of these professionals.

Even so, the leader of the association, which includes nurses and auxiliary staff, among others, said at a press conference in Maputo that the suspension of the strike that was due to start today is an opportunity for “dialogue”, a process in which they are demanding that the government improve working conditions, the professional framework and overtime.

“We very much welcome the government’s invitation with the hope of seeing the concerns of health professionals and society resolved. We look forward to the government’s proposal, which may resolve the most important concerns for health professionals and Mozambique’s society,” Muchave emphasised.

However, he added that so far there has been “nothing concrete” from the government, apart from the information that it has “submitted documents” to various ministries: “Which means that since last year the government has just been going round and round with the documents in the other ministries”.

At issue are APSUSM’s demands, which for three years have been asking the government to provide hospitals with medicines, given the need, in some cases, for patients to buy them, as well as to purchase hospital beds.

They are also asking for the “lack of food” to be resolved, for ambulances to be equipped with emergency supplies and non-disposable personal protective equipment, the absence of which is “forcing staff to buy out of their own pockets”, and for a better framework within the Single Salary Table (TSU).

“We expected something more different from the old government,” Muchave lamented, alluding to the 100 days of the new government, appointed by President Daniel Chapo, which will be marked in mid-April.

The president of APSUSM even says there are currently cases of health professionals not receiving their salaries, without explanation, in addition to the list of demands handed in, situations that aggravate the “precarious work” being done in Mozambican health units.

“So far, we have many cases of health professionals without pay, and we don’t know how these people will do it. We’re starting to romanticise what people’s work is, because people don’t have a way to get to the institutions, they don’t have transport, and they don’t even have a way to eat,” he said.

The Mozambican Minister of Health, Ussene Isse, warned on March 21 that a possible strike in the sector would be “a disaster” and called for dialogue with the professionals.

“A health strike is a disaster, a real disaster. Just imagine not attending to a patient in the resuscitation room for 10 to 15 minutes, a critical patient, what will happen? Death. It’s happened here several times, relatives of our colleagues have lost their lives. Is this a tragedy or not?” asked Minister Ussene Isse, saying that the government has been “guided by dialogue” with professionals in the field to resolve their concerns.

According to the latest figures from the Ministry of Health, the country has 1,778 health units, 107 of which are health posts, three specialised hospitals, four central hospitals, seven general hospitals, seven provincial hospitals, 22 rural hospitals, and 47 district hospitals.

Source: Lusa