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Christi Naude. News24.com,
South Africa. February 10, 2003.
Pietermaritzburg - Cuban doctors have lodged complaints of gross human
rights violations with the Human Rights Commission in regard to the
government-to-government agreement between Cuba and South Africa.
One of the alleged human rights violations includes the dismissal of seven
Limpopo doctors, which was to be opposed in the Johannesburg labour court on
Monday with an application against the department of health to honour their
contracts.
In what the doctors believe is "a revenge attack" after a Special
Assignment programme about their plight in December, two Pietermaritzburg
specialists were told to expect dismissal letters, while seven Cuban doctors in
Limpopo allegedly were given the chop on Friday.
In a meeting on Thursday, described as "no match for the Spanish
inquisition", Cuban officials allegedly told Dr Mario Menchero, a Cuban
orthopaedic surgeon at Grey's Hospital, Pietermaritzburg, that he was a "traitor"
who did not deserve to be on the Cuban programme.
The meeting came after Menchero's cancellation of his Cuban Communist Party
membership after he openly said he could "no longer support the party's
principles.
Cuban house confiscated
An Edendale surgeon received a similar threat when he refused to send his
15-year-old daughter back to Cuba in January - a requirement of a new contract,
given to the doctors in December, last year.
Besides the looming dismissal, further action was taken against the doctor.
The doctor said: "They confiscated my house in Cuba and my savings
account, with my pension money, has been frozen. My daughter is very confused,"
the doctor said, adding that he would not consider splitting his family.
Of the 10 children who were forced to return in January after their 15th
birthdays, only one reached Cuba.
Three parents refused to send their children back, four families absconded
in Spain, one child was "late" and missed the plane and another had "a
fit" and was given one month to recover.
The seven doctors in Limpopo are still recovering from the shock of being
given 48 hours to leave the hospitals where they have been working.
Some refuse to send their children back
One of the doctors in Makopane (Potgietersrus), who lives on the hospital
premises, was given 24 hours to vacate his house.
According to a letter by the Limpopo health department, the doctors "opted
out of the Cuba/South Africa agreement ... opting out of the agreement has
implications on relations between the republics of Cuba and South Africa."
The doctors said they were being "punished" because they either
applied for permanent South African residence, or for requesting not to go to on
the annual compulsory holdiday to Cuba, or refusing to send their children back
after they turned 15.
One of the dismissed doctors apparently previously defected to Spain so that
he wouldn't lose his South African wife, after a threat that his passport would
be confiscated in Cuba.
A letter by Cuban co-ordinator Dr Jaime Davis, of which the Witness has a
copy, informed the Limpopo health department that the Cuban health minister
wanted these doctors out of the programme because they had asked for permanent
residence.
No Cuban doctor, married to a Cuban spouse, should be granted permanent
residence.
About 200 doctors have absconded
Sibani Mngadi, spokesperson for Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang,
denied that Cuba had threatened to cancel the agreement because they were losing
doctors, who applied for permanent residence or absconded to other countries.
Apparently, close to 200 doctors have absconded since 1996.
Mngadi said both parties recommitted themselves at the end of last year.
"The provinces need more Cuban doctors. Requests from all provinces
last month totalled 361 doctors and specialists needed in addition to about 450
already working in South Africa. "KwaZulu-Natal, alone, has asked for more
than 120."
In a letter to an Inkatha Freedom Party MP, Tshabalala-Msimang recently
refused to reinstate a Cuban doctor in the Eastern Cape after he had been
allegedly dismissed and thrown into the Umtata prision.
She said he was employed under the SA/Cuba agreement and her approval of his
request to be reinstated would compromise the relations between the two
countries.
Davis declined to comment, despite a fax and a follow-up call.
The "dismissal" of experienced doctors in South Africa, which
thousands of South African doctors are opting to quit, will leave critical gaps.
According to Dr Elmarie Pieterse, the dismissal of her specialist physician
husband will have serious implications for the intensive-care unit at Warmbaths
Hospital in Bela Bela.
"There are two patients connected to ventilators. With no other
experienced doctor to run the facility, it may as well close down."
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