Trainee nurses demand increase in allowance

The Ghana Nurses and Midwives Trainees Association says the government must increase the amount it is proposing to give them as monthly allowance.

A technical committee set up by the government to look into the cancellation of nursing trainees allowance recommended that the students receive a monthly allowance of GHc 150.

However, the students argue that the recommended amount is woefully inadequate per the memorandum of understanding signed between the trainees on one hand and the Ministry of Health on another in 2014.

In a statement signed yesterday [Thursday] by the Minister of Health, Alex Segbefia, he said 34,500 nursing students who are currently pursuing various levels of health professional training across the country would be paid GHC150 a month.

The statement further indicated that “the payment amount would serve as a bridging mechanism pending the amendment of the Students Loan Trust Act, to enable students in non-tertiary Health Training Institutions access loans to support their education.”

But speaking to Accra-based Citi FM, President of the Ghana Nurses and Midwives Trainees Association, Godwin Asabire Akazeem, said they demand an increment of the stated amount.

“As for the 150 Ghana cedis, we don’t see it as something we have to accept. Because per the memorandum of understanding we signed in 2014, we were made to understand that if that 40 percent service allowance is going to be expressed in monetary value and given to us, it should be 50 percent the current amount of money they are taking now” he said.

Akazeem mentioned that the money supports the students in diverse ways hence the need for the increase.

“There was the need for the government to give them service allowance to help them foot their clinical bills and other things they do. The fight for their own accommodation, taking cars, going to the ward and coming back and all. It definitely has to be increased” he reiterated.