The Director in the Ministry of Health, Naledi Mlaudzi, has denied any knowledge of a Court order issued last year by Justice Isaac Lesetedi ordering them to pay Institution of Health Sciences lectures overtime allowances.
“This is my first time to hear about such an order,” Mlaudzi said. “I have literally never seen the order that you are talking about.”
This is despite the fact that Francistown-based lawyer, Walter David Ditiro, who was representing the Institution of Health Sciences lectures who had successfully sued the MOH for not paying them overtime allowances recently said that the MoH had assured him that all the concerned lecturers will be paid their allowances and whatever else they are owed in July.
He said that the Ministry gave him the assurance after he had written several letters to them reminding them about Lesetedi’s order made last September and what delaying in carrying out the order might lead to.
“I have been assured that the order will be carried out in July and I trust them,” he said.
This week, Ditiro was not available to explain who exactly in the Ministry had promised him that they will pay this month as his cell phone continuously rang without being answered.
Also not available to answer inquiries on the matter was the Ministry’s lawyer, Motlalepula Segopolo, who was continuously reported to be “busy”.
The order that the lecturers should be paid overtime allowances was made by Lesetedi who said that there was no basis for denying the lecturers overtime allowances that is paid to other nurses working in clinics and hospitals and ordered that they should be paid.
