President Bola Tinubu’s government has pledged to ensure the different categories of workers in all sectors enjoy protection and to always respond swiftly to their calls and complaints.

Labour minister Simon Lalong said this when the leadership of the National Association of Medical and Dental Academics (NAMDA) visited him in his office on Wednesday in Abuja.

Mr Lalong said the federal government would respond quickly to their calls and complaints. According to him, the federal government has been taking stock of the peculiar needs and grievances of different categories of labour organisations.

“Government has been working assiduously to address them effectively,” he said.

The minister, however, assured NAMDA that measures to address their complaints and grievances were already on course and would be concluded to their satisfaction.

NAMDA national president Nosa Orhue congratulated Mr Lalong on his ministerial appointment.

Mr Orhue also pledged the association’s support to the federal government in salvaging medical education in the country and general education.

He noted that the association were faced with some challenges.

“The challenges include the disparity in the entry point salary grade level between our association, as doctors teaching in the university system and our counterparts in the hospital system. whose entry point salary ranks higher,” he said.

Mr Orhue noted that the disparity should be closed, as it discourages doctors from working in the university system, posing a challenge to medical education in Nigeria.

He called on the minister’s support in pushing for the implementation of the agreement with the federal government to extend the retirement age of their category of medical doctors.

He also called for implementing the special pension benefit, as captured in the PENSION ACT 2014, for their category of workers.

Mr Orhue also appealed for the payment of the withheld salary of their members, as they did not take part in the Academic Staff Union of Universities strike for which it was withheld.

He also commended the ministry’s management for its quick response to industrial relations issues.

(NAN)