PROPER PLACEMENT: UGONSA GETS BACK TO POLICE SERVICE COMMISSION

The Chairman,

Police Service Commission (PSC),

Federal Secreteriat Complex, Phase I,

 Shehu Shagari Way Maitama, Abuja, Nigeria

Sir,

RE: PLACEMENT OF GRADUATES OF BACHELOR OF NURSING SCIENCE (B.N.Sc) DEGREE BELOW PAR: PLEASE, KINDLY RECTIFY THIS ABBERATION

SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS

Your response to our letter on the above subject matter – dated 22^nd March, 2017, was well received. The warm tone of your candid response sincerely rekindled our modest belief in the Nigerian Police Force (NPF) as an organisation that strives, at all times, to promote equity, fairness, justice and peace.

     2. However, in line with your advise that we forward Nurse’s schemes of Service on which such issues would be addressed, we wish to humbly inform you that as stated in the circular – Ref no. HCSF/EPO/EIR/CND/100/5T dated 7^th September, 2016 – released by the office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation (HSCF), which conveyed the approval of internship training for the graduates of B.N.Sc degree, the new approved Nurse’s Schemes of Service shall reflect in the next edition of the Schemes of Service for use in the Civil Service of the Federation, which the office of the HCSF had promised to publish very soon (refer Annexure A).
  
     3. Moreover, because the commencement of the approved internship programme was with immediate effect, the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria (N&MCN), the statutory regulatory body for nursing education, practice and administration had in her memo – Ref no. N&MCN/SG/RO/CIR/24/VOL.4/4 dated February 3, 2017 –  addressed to all government Ministries,  Agencies, and Parastatals that engage the service of nurses (including the NPF), verily conveyed the commencement of one year compulsory internship training as part of the university education of the graduates of the B.N.Sc degree (refer Annexure B). 
     
 4. The council also succinctly spelt out the current grading, remuneration and placement of the graduates of the B.N.Sc degree on page 4 (Section 3.1) of the implementation guide for the internship programme that accompanied the memo (refer Annexure C), as CONHESS 8 Step 3 (GL 9 Step 3) for Nurse interns/ Nurse Corp members and CONHESS 9 step 3 (GL 10 step 3) post-NYSC (National Youth Service Corps). 

     5. It therefore follows that approval of internship training for the graduates of B.N.Sc verily restored the parity that exists between the profession of Pharmacy and Nursing in Nigeria, as is the case in Great Britain, in accordance with the Industrial Arbitration panel award of the year 1981 (refer Annexure D). 
   
\  6. To this end, there is no more basis for continued discrimination or subjugation of the graduate nurses a rank below their par (the graduate pharmacists) in the Police Service as both the profession of nursing and pharmacy, being on parity – equally share similar entry requirement, course duration and internship training duration for the first degree. 
       
7. Therefore, the argument that has been used perennially to sustain the unwarranted inequity of underplacement of graduates of B.N.Sc on a rank below par, which was that Pharmacists unlike graduate nurses run a one-year internship training upon graduation, has expired and thus no longer holds water. 

     8. Consequently, the basis for appointment of graduates of Bachelor of Pharmacy (B.Pharm) degree, post-NYSC, into the Police Service on any considered rank, similarly justifies why the graduates of the B.N.Sc degree must be appointed onto same rank. 

     9. As we shall certainly forward you copy of the Schemes of Service that shall reflect the new salary and placement structure for Nurses as soon as it is publish by the office of the HCSF, we hope that the attached extant circulars shall properly guide you to expeditiously address the issue.

 10. Please kindly accept the assurances of our esteemed warmest nightingale regards!

Signed

                                                                      

Chief (Hon) S.E.O. EGWUENU                                                              Nurse G.I. Nshi

     National President                                                                                National Secretary