Published 9th Mar, 2024

By Tola Owoyele

Dr. Amos Akinbiyi, a clinical professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at the University of Saskatchewan, Canada, has detailed how two remarkable developments led to the postponement of a mediation that was supposed to be the first step in a suit he filed against the university’s hospital management.

Akinbiyi had dragged the management of the university’s hospital, also known as Regina General Hospital, to court in late 2023, when he claimed to have been subjected to many acts of bullying by its members.

After filing the suit, a Canadian high court set March 7 as the mediation date.

A few days before the period set for the mediation, however, an interesting incident happened.

“A few days before the March 7 mediation day, the judge who was supposed to oversee the process suddenly declared a conflict of interest and excused himself from the matter,” Akinbiyi told FIJ in an interview on Saturday morning.

“When the mediation did not materialise, we again deliberated yesterday, March 8, and then settled for March 21 as a new date. But, shockingly, the new judge supposed to mediate the process also declared a conflict of interest.

“I demanded to know the real reasons both judges excused themselves from the process, but not a single person, including my lawyer, could give me a tangible answer.

“I then directed my lawyer to write the court, highlighting my concerns that the incessant conflict of interest excuses the judges were giving were affecting my practice.

“Most of the patients who had been waiting in line for about six months to see me for their medical appointments have had to reschedule again and again.

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“A new mediation date has been set, and it is March 25. We have also pleaded with the court to help assign a judge who will help see the matter to a reasonable conclusion.

“On my part, I will not give up on the struggle till I get justice.”

In December 2023, FIJ reported how Akinbiyi was forced to resuscitate his own daughter, who had suffered a cardiac arrest twice, by the hospital’s management.

The incident happened in September 2017. After he managed to revive his daughter, he verbally registered his displeasure with the hospital, stating that he should not have been forced to treat his own daughter when any other doctor could have been assigned to her.

Rather than get a formal apology from the hospital, however, he was subjected to several acts of harassment and intimidation that included several claims that he had mismanaged several patient cases in his 40 years of working at the hospital.

He was later suspended from practicing at the hospital, and this led to him suing the hospital. The main defendants in the case are the Regina General Hospital and the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA), the health authority that provides direct and contracted health services in the region.

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