By Yusuf Boluwatife
Ladoke Akintola University Teaching Hospital, Ogbomoso has embarked on an indefinite strike after a politician, Femi Onireti, allegedly instructed his supporters to beat up a medical doctor on duty at the hospital premises.
In a statement on Tuesday by its its spokesperson, Omotayo Ogunleye, the hospital said that the strike action following the alleged assault on the doctor whose name it refused to give, will continue until the said politician tenders an apology to the victim and the hospital.
Onireti, who is a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, according to the statement, came to the hospital and started commanding the doctor on duty to place his relative who is on admission at the Accident and Emergency Ward on oxygen and take him to the Intensive Care Unit.
The management said Onireti’s aides thought a medical doctor was filming their benefactor’s unruly action. The aides then pounced on the doctor and beat him up.
“While condemning the politician’s manner of interfering with the management of the patient which was brought to the hospital for medical attention, the management noted that such an act would not be tolerated.
“The politician was commanding the doctors to place his patient on oxygen and also instructed that he should be taken to the Intensive Care Unit. The politician, with the help of his aides, descended on a medical doctor, a staff of the hospital, thinking the doctor was filming their devilish displays at the A&E section of the hospital.
“Owing to the assault by Mr Onireti and his aides, the doctors at the hospital have embarked on indefinite strike until an apology is tendered to the hospital and phones seized from the victim by the politician and his aides are returned,” the management stated.
Meanwhile, Onireti has reacted to the allegation in a statement issued on his behalf by a media consultant, Busayo Olawoyin. The PDP chieftain claimed that he did not beat up any doctor nor instructed his aides to do such.
Though he admitted that a commotion broke out, he said it was settled almost immediately, describing the strike action by the doctors as blackmail.
