Zimbabwe’s junior doctors have agreed to return to work, ending a strike that has lasted for over four months, after they accepted an offer from a Zimbabwean telecoms billionaire.

The strike was one of the longest in the country’s history and brought the public healthcare system to its knees.

But the strike is finally over after the unsettled junior doctors finally accepted to be part of Econet founder, Strive Masiyiwa, training fellowship offer.

WuzupNigeria reports that the mobile telecoms mogul had in 2019 set up a $100 million fund which grants $5 000 each to 2 000 junior and senior doctors employed by the government on top of what they are earning from their employer.

The medical practitioners last September embarked on a four-month strike that brought services in the country’s major hospital to a standstill.

They were fighting to tie government down to payment of their monthly wages in US dollars or through the US dollar interbank equivalent.

In attempts to break the prolonged impasse between the parties, Masiyiwa, through his philanthropic Higher Life Foundation dangled the offer.

Through their representative Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association, the medical staff had initially elected to put the foundation’s offer behind their immediate priorities fearing it could jeopardise their wage negotiations with their employer.

However, after the government has adamantly refused to give in to their demands, the doctors have since returned to work while extending their gratitude to the mobile telecoms giant’s offer.

Said the doctors’ group,

“In light of the recent developments, the ZHDA wants to extend its gratitude to the Higherlife Foundation for extending the offer once again to all government doctors. The ZHDA is encouraging its entire membership to go and apply for the training fellowship before the stipulated deadline.

“The ZHDA remains eager and committed in engaging all the responsible authorities and interested parties in finding a long-lasting solution to the doctors’ welfare and to working conditions in hospitals for the benefit of our patients.”

UK-based Strive Masiyiwa will pay each doctor a subsistence allowance of about $300 (£230) and provide them with transport to work, through a fund he set up.

Most of the doctors on strike were earning less than $100 a month.

The billionaire will fund the doctors for six months and it’s not clear what will happen after that.

The strike has killed an unknown number of people, according to the senior doctors’ association, who have called it a “silent genocide”.

The doctors went on strike pressing for wages to be pegged to the US dollar as a cushion against rising inflation in the worst economic crisis in a decade.