The government has scrapped the mandatory clause which forces nurses not to travel outside the country to work there for five years in a new move aimed at curbing the number of unemployment of nurses and midwives in the country.
There a lot of nurses who have still not been posted to various health facilities in the country simply because the number of graduates churned out by the several institutions far outweighs vacancy in the job market. To stop this, the government is getting rid of the bonding law which was introduced in 2005 to stop brain drain the country.
“Bonding is stopped now,” Deputy Health minister Tina Mensah announced Thursday, but did not give details on when the decision was taken by government.
Under the system, nurses trained in public health training institutions had to serve in Ghana for five years before they could leave the shores of the country to practice elsewhere.
A decade after, government began a review of the bonding system with the view to cancelling it in order to allow nurses and midwives who graduate to seek employment in the private sector and outside the country without having to serve in Ghana.
Speaking on the side-lines of the 4th annual general meeting and scientific conference of the Ghana College of Nurses and Midwives, Ms Mensah said graduates can now leave to practice anywhere in the world once they are done with their national service.
“Now it is no more there so you’ve not been bonded,” she emphasised, adding, “now that they are no more bonded, you’re free to go”.
She indicated that the trainee allowance being paid should not be misconstrued as a form of bonding, saying, “When you’re given allowances it doesn’t mean you’ve been bonded”.
“Those who were bonded they cannot go [outside Ghana now] because when you make your application, they will make a search on it and then find out you’ve been bonded and you cannot go out there,” she explained.
SOURCE: www.Ghgossip.com
