NEHAWU North West Notes The Announcement By MEC of Helalth on Witrand Hospital and Demands Urgent Action on Systemic Failures in Health Facilities
Saturday June 28, 2025
The National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union [NEHAWU] in the North West notes the announcement by the MEC for Health, Sello Lehari, regarding the appointment of a nine-member investigation team to probe the alleged death of a long-term patient at Witrand Psychiatric Hospital, as well as a separate incident involving a patient who allegedly absconded from Mahikeng Provincial Hospital.
While we acknowledge this intervention, NEHAWU wishes to remind the Department that these incidents are not isolated, nor are they unforeseen. As a union, we have consistently raised concerns with the department’s management structures about the deteriorating state of patient care, chronic understaffing, and appalling conditions under which both workers and patients are expected to survive in our health institutions.
For months, and in some cases years, the union has raised with management issues of patients’ safety, including:
- Inadequate security measures at facilities, particularly in psychiatric hospitals and general wards.
- Lack of essential amenities for patients, clean linen, and sufficient hot water- a shocking reality in facilities mandated to provide dignified, humane care.
- Poor infrastructure maintenance, broken water boilers, chronic food shortages, and insufficient resources to ensure the well-being of long-term and vulnerable patients.
- The unsafe working conditions of our members who have been pleading for the department to intervene decisively before more lives are lost.
As recent as two weeks ago, a worker at Tshepong Hospital’s laundry department narrowly escaped losing his hand while operating a faulty laundry machine- a machine that workers had repeatedly reported to hospital management as unsafe and in need of urgent repair. It is by sheer luck that the worker’s life was not permanently altered. This incident is yet another example of the department’s gross negligence and disregard for worker safety in the province’s public health facilities.
These systemic failures are not new and have been repeatedly tabled at various labour-management forums, occupational health and safety committee meetings, and during union engagements with both hospital management and departmental leadership. It is therefore disingenuous for the department to react only when tragedies surface on social media while workers and patients suffer in silence daily.
As NEHAWU, we demand that the investigation team’s scope be broadened beyond these two incidents to address the underlying operational and management deficiencies across all health facilities in the province. A piecemeal, reactive approach to crisis management will not resolve the deep-seated crisis engulfing the public health system in the North West.
As NEHAWU, we further call for:
- The MEC to urgently address the chronic shortages of food, clothing, linen, and functioning hot water systems at Witrand Psychiatric Hospital and other affected facilities.
- The immediate repair and safety audit of all hospital equipment, starting with high-risk areas such as laundries, kitchens and psychiatric units.
- The swift implementation of outstanding occupational health and safety improvements to protect both workers and patients.
We reiterate that the dignity, safety, and wellbeing of patients and workers must not be negotiable. It is a constitutional imperative.
NEHAWU will closely monitor the outcomes of the investigation and will seek an urgent audience with the MEC to discuss implementation of the report.
END
Issued by NEHAWU North West Secretariat Office
For more information, please contact: Zanele Lawu (Provincial Secretary) at 079 506 2503 or email: zanelelawu@gmail.com or
Mpho Mohlala (Provincial Deputy Secretary) at 063 685 1931 or email: mphomo@nehawu.org.za
Visit https://www.nehawu.org.za
More Statements
