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Agency 'lacks' mandate to admit KMTC students, Health CS says
The entrance to the Kenya Medical Training College (KMTC) in Nairobi. FILE PHOTO | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
- The CS said relevant ministries had agreed that only the institution has the legal mandate to admit students when the dispute first came up during last year’s intake.
- The senators had sought to know what the government was doing to end the stalemate between the ministries of Health and Education.
- Mr Macharia said officials would go through the lists of those admitted by the two agencies and check out common names before exploring ways to ensure the rest do not forfeit their vacancies.
The Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Services has no powers to admit students to the Kenya Medical Training Colleges (KMTC), Health Cabinet Secretary James Macharia has said.
The CS said relevant ministries had agreed that only the institution has the legal mandate to admit students when the dispute first came up during last year’s intake.
“We resolved that KMTC is mandated to admit students. What happened this year was not expected,” Mr Macharia said.
He added that the head of Public Service has since issued a directive confirming that KMTC should be allowed to continue with its mandate and all parties that filed cases in court should withdraw them.
“It is unfortunate that government agencies are suing each other,” Mr Macharia said, adding that the KMTC Act that gives it admission powers was not repealed when the placement services came into place.
“The KMTC Act was not repealed. That is the legal opinion we are relying on,” Mr Macharia said when he appeared before the Senate Health Committee, chaired by Isiolo Senator Mohammed Kuti (URP).
END STALEMATE
The senators had sought to know what the government was doing to end the stalemate between the ministries of Health and Education.
Prof Wilfred Lesan (Bomet, URP) said the protracted disagreements between the placement services and KMTC is not good given that both are government agencies.
Deputy Speaker Kembi Gitura sought to know what would happen to the students who had been admitted by the placement services.
“They are qualified and cannot be blamed for the two agencies’ fights,” he said.
Mr Macharia said officials would go through the lists of those admitted by the two agencies and look for names appearing on both before exploring ways to ensure the rest do not forfeit their vacancies.
He said the placement services had admitted fewer students compared with the 4,860 selected by KMTC. Mr Macharia said it would be easy to accommodate about 1,000 students whose names might not be on both lists.
