Ethiopia's doctors launched a nationwide strike to protest low pay and poor working conditions, joining among the lowest-paid medics in East Africa. The Ethiopian Health Professionals Movement (EHPM), formed in 2019, issued a 12-point list demanding fair salaries, health insurance, transport support and improved workplace conditions. The government immediately declared the strike illegal, and hundreds of doctors walked out when authorities did not engage. Security forces arrested striking physicians, detaining some for weeks in crowded cells without family contact or basic hygiene. Rights groups report the government adopted repressive tactics against the striking health professionals.
In a hospital in Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa, in mid-May, Tewodros* was at work treating patients when two police officers barged into the emergency room. Earlier that same month, the doctor had participated in a public sector health workers' strike, protesting poor working conditions and low pay. The government had immediately declared the strike illegal, setting the stage for a tense standoff with the country's health professionals.
The officers said they were taking him in for questioning but gave no reason, Tewodros says. They grabbed him and pulled him out of the ward. His colleagues tried to intervene, but the police ignored them and took him to a nearby station, where he was held for more than three weeks. That was the moment I felt helpless. That was the moment I was ashamed of my country, Tewodros told Al Jazeera, recounting the incident.
The strike was led by the Ethiopian Health Professionals Movement (EHPM), a loose collective of doctors that had formed in 2019. On May 19, they issued a 12-point list of demands to the government, including requests for fair salaries, health insurance, transport support and improved workplace conditions. When the deadline passed with no meaningful engagement from authorities, hundreds of doctors began walking out of hospitals across the country.
Collection
[
|
...
]