CAIRO: Doctors ended their overnight sit-in at the Doctors’ Syndicate Monday after the general assembly’s decision to hold a strike on May 10 and another open strike on May 17 was officially approved by the syndicate’s board.
Doctors held a sit-in and blocked Al-Qasr Al-Aini Street in protest against the syndicate’s board’s refusal to officially approve the decision Sunday.
Syndicate board members said that they can’t sign on the decision because it wasn’t stamped as the specialized employee wasn’t there.
However, the decision was signed and stamped Monday morning.
"We felt that the syndicate’s board is stalling and will not authorize the strike," said Mona Mina, spokesperson of Doctors Without Rights movement.
The syndicate’s official website called the voting on the decision to strike an "opinion poll," which angered the doctors and prompted them to protest at the office of board member, Abdel Fatah Rezq, before he agreed to their demands.
Doctors are demanding the resignation of Minister of Health Ashraf Hatem, adequate security at hospitals, setting a minimum and maximum wage, and increasing the health budget to 15 percent from the current 4.5 percent of national budget.
A dispute between members and the syndicate’s board over the mechanism of voting on the open strike resulted in physical clashes between members on stage.
