Patients to suffer in Tharaka Nithi as doctors call for strike, nurses down tools
What you need to know:
- The union also wants doctors who were scrapped from the county’s payroll for being ghost workers reinstated and paid their pending three months’ salary.
- Newly recruited doctors, they say, should also be paid their full salary and issued with personal numbers and pay slips and other specialists employed.
- On Thursday, KMPDU Tharaka-Nithi branch secretary Dr Antony Tatu said their efforts to engage the county since 2014 has never been unsuccessful.
Patients seeking medical services in Tharaka-Nithi County will have to endure more pain after doctors issued a 14-day strike notice even as a nurses' strike enters its fourth day.
Speaking on Thursday, the medics demanded immediate promotions and remittance of their statutory deductions.
A letter signed by Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) Secretary-General Ouma Oluga said the doctors will down their tools on November 21.
The letter, addressed to Governor Samuel Ragwa, said the county has been mistreating doctors.
“As a union, we have been forced to result to this unwarranted measure given to the economic loss to our members, frustrations and lack of commitment on the part of the county as the employer,” the letter said.
The union also wants doctors who were scrapped from the county’s payroll for allegedly being ghost workers to be reinstated and paid their three-months back salaries.
Newly recruited doctors, they say, should also be paid their full salaries and issued with personal numbers and payslips. The union also wants other specialists hired.
On Thursday, KMPDU Tharaka-Nithi branch secretary Antony Tatu said their efforts to engage the county since 2014 have failed.
“We have exhausted all other avenues before issuing a strike notice to our employer,” said Dr Tatu.
Meanwhile, nurses in the county are still on strike. A spot-check by the Nation showed that major public hospitals remained deserted, with no patients or staff.
Private hospitals like Chogoria Mission Hospital and St Orsola Catholic Mission Hospital were overwhelmed by the high number of patients seeking services there.
Private clinics and pharmacies have also taken advantage of the crisis and raised charges for services and medicines.
Kenya National Union of Nurses branch secretary Kenneth Micheni maintained that they will not resume duty until a permanent solution for their grievances is found.
“We are fed up with lies by the county government and we chose to stay at home until a permanent solution is found,” said Mr Micheni in a press briefing in Chuka town.
In related news, Governor Ragwa has maintained that the nurses’ strike was instigated by his political rivals who want to ruin his record.
“My political rivals are using nurses to fight me,” said Mr Ragwa when contacted for comment.
