They criticize millionaire payments to Cuban doctors in South Africa while local professionals suffer unemployment

The Department of Health of the Gauteng province of South Africa spends annually $745,652 (equivalent to R14.3 million) in the procurement of 11 Cuban doctors, generating criticism given the considerable number of unemployed local doctors.

Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko, Minister of Health and Welfare of this district, in which the city of Johannesburg is located, made this information public during a consultation with opposition political groups in the provincial legislature, the media reported. BusinessTech.

The official pointed out that the salary of Cuban doctors ranges between R1 and 1.6 million annually, 52,522 and 84,016 dollars, respectively.

He explained that of the total number of professionals, four are located in the Johannesburg Metropolitan Health District, three in the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Health District, two in the Sedibeng Metropolitan Health District, while one operates at Thelle Mogoerane Hospital and another at Tembisa.

This hiring sparked controversy because at the beginning of 2014, some 700 local doctors Qualified workers could not find work in the public sector, the aforementioned media reported.

In this regard, Jack Bloom, member of the Executive Health Council of the Democratic Alliance Party, questioned that it is strange that the country spends money on training local doctors only to then be unemployed.

Bloom considered that this hiring is disconcerting since Cuban doctors do not have specialized skills that cannot be done by local professionals.

However, the export of Cuban doctors to South Africa has its origins in a bilateral agreement signed in 1996 between both nations.

Said pact between Nelson Mandela and Fidel Castro, improved primary health care in South Africa, according to Naledi Pandor, Minister of International Relations and Cooperation.

Under this agreement, the African nation sends hundreds of medical students to Cuban schools, whose tuition is paid by the South African state, and in exchange, the Caribbean nation sends doctors to work in the South African public health system.

South African Health Minister Joseph Phaahla recently acknowledged in Parliament that the government has increased the training of doctors in the last 15 years, both at local universities and in Cuba.

Phaahla noted that in the last decade the number of professionals has doubled, with 1,338 graduates entering the internship program in 2014 and increasing to 2,210 in 2024, he reported. Business Tech.

However, the controversy over the hiring of Cuban professionals in South Africa is not new.

In 2022, the government of the African nation entered into a dispute with opposition parties that demanded a response on the payment to Cuba of $19 million dollars (308 million rand, the local currency) in salaries of doctors and engineers of the Caribbean country.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) party demanded actions for the Ministry of Labor to clarify the hiring of more than 229 Cuban doctors and 65 engineers when the African country was going through an unemployment crisis and a stagnant economy with high inflation rates, the platform reported. Eyewitness News.

At the beginning of the year, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, Tomoya Obokata, reiterated his call on the Cuban state to respond to serious accusations of alleged human rights abuses suffered by Cuban professionals in international missions. The accusation also implicates recipient countries, such as South Africa in this case.

In a communication dated November 2, 2023, the Special Rapporteur expressed concern about alleged abuses of fundamental rights, such as privacy, freedom of expression and association, as well as freedom of movement of Cuban professionals on temporary work missions abroad .