It is emerging that the sexcapade at the Essikado Hospital in the Sekondi Takoradi Metropolis has been an age-old tradition, more worrying than meets the eye.
Since the story of the alleged raping of a nurse by a doctor at the Essikado Hospital broke recently, 3news.com has been flooded with mindboggling stories of victims who suffered almost similar despicable acts at the facility.
A former nurse at the facility recalled the several attempts by both doctors and administrators to go to bed with her. Unfortunately, some of her colleagues have succumbed and fallen victims to the intense pressure.
A Technical Officer at the laboratory department, who also recalled incessant sexual harassment she endured in the hands of a former administrator at the hospital, also mentioned how the alleged rapist doctor, who is the Medical Superintendent at the facility, rather urged her to give in to her boss’ sexual demands.
The girl, who has pleaded for anonymity for security reasons and to avoid being victimised further, said because sexual harassment appeared to be the order of the day at the Essikado Hospital, the Medical Director ignored appeals to him to call the administrator, whose name was given as Wahab Mahama, to order.
According to her, when the medical director at the Essikado Hospital was not attending to her issue, she was compelled to formally file a written complaint to him, for the records, and copied the Regional Human Resource Manager of the Ghana Health Service, Mr. Jacob Essel.
After two weeks of not getting any response from the Medical Director, she followed up to the regional office of the GHS, where she met the Regional Administrator, Thomas Tawiah who confirmed receipt of her letter.
He promised to resolve the issue amicably upon his return from leave, which he was due. But because the story was precarious and her safety was in danger, the Regional Administrator requested that she is excused from duty, but that was turned down by the Medical Superintendent at the Essikado Hospital.
The harassment, she said, persisted for a while. Luckily, a committee was set up by Dr. Emmanuel Tinkorang, the Western Regional Director of the Ghana Health Service to investigate her issue. Members of the committee included regional Deputy Director Clinical Care, Chief Nursing Officer in the region, Matron of the Essikado Hospital, Accountant of the hospital and the Regional Medical Director.
After hearing from those involved, Mr. Wahab Mahama was found to have acted improperly and sanctioned accordingly.
When 3news.com contacted Thomas Tawiah, Regional Administrator, though he would not open up or delve into the issue, he confirmed the case has been addressed by the regional Ghana Health Service.
Mr. Wahab Mahama, he said, was suspended in line with the “disciplinary procedures” for his action.
“We realized he has the intention to do that so we punished him. We suspended him for six months. He has resumed after serving part of the punishment, but he is no more the head, he is working under somebody else…when we realized that his behavior has changed then we will lift the sanction.”
Meanwhile, 3news.com has also been following the circumstance under which the Technical Officer-Lab was kidnapped in June, 2016 and injected with cannabis as well as police in Sekondi’s lackadaisical attitude towards the case.
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