The Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU) and the Assembly of Healthcare Professional Associations have declared an indefinite nationwide strike effective Saturday, November 15, 2025.
The unions cited the Federal Government’s persistent failure to implement the adjusted Consolidated Health Salary Structure (CONHESS) and resolve longstanding welfare and systemic issues affecting health workers as the reason for the strike.
The decision was announced in a statement signed by the National Chairman of JOHESU, Comrade Kabiru Ado Minjibir, and made available on Friday.
The shutdown of JOHESU-affiliated unions comes at a time when the Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) is already on an indefinite strike.
JOHESU represents several key unions, including the Medical and Health Workers’ Union of Nigeria, the Nigerian Union of Allied Health Professionals, the Senior Staff Association of Universities, Teaching Hospitals, Research Institutes and Associated Institutions, and the Non-Academic Staff Union of Educational and Associated Institutions.
While JOHESU said the delayed CONHESS implementation was the main trigger, it added that other unresolved issues also prompted the shutdown.
“The crux of the matter in the present circumstance is the long delay in the implementation of the High-Level Body (HLB) Committee’s report on the adjusted Consolidated Health Salary Structure since its submission to the Presidential Committee on Salaries and Wages in 2022,” the statement read.
“Nothing has been done by successive administrations to redress this infraction. Despite the well-advertised assurances of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR, when a two-man delegation of JOHESU visited him on June 5, 2023, to advance the FG’s resolve to get JOHESU to suspend its strike, this demand remains unattended to,” the statement said.
JOHESU added that delays were initially blamed on the absence of the Presidential Committee on Salaries (PCS), which had not been reconstituted.
Even after its reconstitution, the unions said the issue was ignored until the last 48 hours, when the government finally took steps to address what JOHESU called one of Nigeria’s most prolonged labour demands.
The PUNCH
