Nurses take govt to court on deployment
The High Court in Lilongwe has granted 300 nurse/midwife technicians permission to seek a judicial review on government’s decision to withdraw their letters of engagement and conduct interviews for the same positions.
Under the new arrangement, only about 100 new graduates would be employed.
In September this year, Ministry of Health (MoH) withdrew offer letters of employment to the newly recruited nurse/midwife technicians and nursing officers, but did not give reasons for the withdrawal.
MoH has since organised interviews which were expected to take place between November 17 and 20 this year.
High Court judge Lloyd Muhara granted the 300 health personnel leave for judicial review on Monday after hearing affidavits and statement of facts from a nursing officer, Chisomo Malango, who was posted to Dedza effective September before his offer of employment was withdrawn.
The nurses are seeking the judicial review on the grounds that the decision to withdraw their offers of employment was illegal and unreasonable.
The judge further ordered that the hearing for judicial review be expedited and application be made before a judge in open court.
In a related development, National Organisation of Nurses and Midwives of Malawi (Nonm) has obtained an injunction through the High Court in Blantyre stopping the Health Services Commission from conducting interviews for recruitment of nurses and midwives and nurse/midwife technicians. n
