Union to evaluate Government's offer after pay increase negotiations
Kenya National Union of Nurses Secretary-General Seth Panyako. His camp has asked nurses to continue their strike. FILE PHOTO | JEFF ANGOTE | NATION MEDIA GROUP
What you need to know:
- Kenya National Union of Nurses general secretary Seth Panyako said on Saturday evening that the union had finalised talks with the government but the strike cannot be called off until the union’s top organ endorses the agreement.
- He said it was not possible for the government to increase the doctors pay by 300 per cent as they had demanded as it was unaffordable.
- As the strike entered its sixth day on Saturday, patients in cholera-ravaged Tana River and Taita Taveta counties trooped to Tanzania to seek treatment.
Nurses may call off their nationwide strike on Monday if the governing council of their union endorses what their representatives agreed upon with government officials on Saturday.
Kenya National Union of Nurses general secretary Seth Panyako said on Saturday evening that the union had finalised talks with the government but the strike cannot be called off until the union’s top organ endorses the agreement.
“We have concluded the discussion in terms of what the government has offered. And that offer is subject to being presented to the national governing council, which will be meeting on Monday,” he told the Sunday Nation.
“The national governing council called the strike and only they can say ‘suspend’ or ‘end’ the strike,” he said.
Kisii Governor James Ongwae, who chairs the health committee of the Council of Governors, told Sunday Nation on Saturday that the nurses’ grievances had been agreed on. The details would be revealed on Sunday.
As the strike entered its sixth day on Saturday, patients in cholera-ravaged Tana River and Taita Taveta counties trooped to Tanzania to seek treatment.
Nurses there said the strike had not been called off and warned that their colleagues at Kenyatta National Hospital may strike on Tuesday.
At the same time, a leadership dispute in the Kenya National Union of Nurses played out in public with the union’s former chairman Josephinus Musundi and the current chairman John Biiya trading barbs at separate press conferences in Nairobi.
The government’s talks with doctors are still at a stalemate. Dr Ouma Oluga, the secretary-general of the Kenya Medical Practitioners Pharmacists and Dentists Union, said doctors will not return to work until a collective bargaining agreement is signed. “Our strike will end the day the agreement is implemented,” he said on Saturday.
LEAVING KENYANS TO DIE
Government spokesman Eric Kiraithe held a joint press conference with Mr Musundi and other unionists allied to the Kenya Health Professionals Society. They all questioned the wisdom behind leaving Kenyans to die in the push for more money.
It was also a day when specialist doctors and consultants who had been offering emergency services at Kenyatta National Hospital joined the strike together with lecturers at the medical school of the University of Nairobi.
A source privy to the negotiations between the Ministry of Health and the doctors’ union said the government “is unhappy” with the way the health workers’ strike was being handled.
According to the source who requested anonymity, there was a growing anger over the hardline positions, particularly on the Health ministry side. Head of Public Service Joseph Kinyua is said to have made “progress” in the negotiations and the government tabled an offer.
Mr Biiya, the nurses union chairman, said as much in a press conference.
“For the last two days we’ve had extensive genuine meetings unlike previous days when we were being taken in circles,” he said and added: “Some masquerades were purporting to be calling off the strike on behalf of union. Whatever was flying out was just but a hoax,” he added.
Mr Seth Panyako, the nurses union general secretary, said their negotiations with government “have recorded good progress but no agreement has been reached yet”.
“Our national governing council has been invited to Nairobi on Monday to review the progress made and give directions on the next course of action,” he said. Mr Panyako noted that one core demand that must be met before the strike ends is for county governments to sign agreements with the union.
He said that after that, the nurses will be seeking to get a collective bargaining agreement that applies to nurses in all counties.
But at a press conference at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre, Mr Kiraithe asked why doctors and nurses continued with the strike, placing Kenyans’ lives at risk.
JUSTIFY A BOYCOTT
“The greatest burden you will all carry to your grave is to go to die in the knowledge that there is a day you could have saved a life and you failed to do so because you wanted a little bit more coins on your payslip,” the government spokesman said.
Mr Kiraithe lauded members of the Kenya Health Professionals Society, which says it comprises of laboratory scientists, nutritionists, medical engineers, physiotherapists for continuing to work despite the standoff.
The government spokesman said they will be protected.
At the same press conference, Mr Musundi, the former nurses union chairman, downplayed the demands being made by nurses, saying the few matters remaining in the signing of an agreement do not justify a boycott.
“Something is not right in this strike. There is no way I can negotiate for 25 per cent and my colleagues are negotiating for 300 per cent,” he said.
Elsewhere, in patients in Taita Taveta county went to Tanzania owing to a cholera outbreak.
The sick were taken to Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Centre and Marangu Lutheran Hospital in Moshi.
A patient, Ms Josephine Mbatia, was taken to Kilimanjaro on Saturday after she became worse.
Speaking to the Sunday Nation on phone, a relative of Ms Mbatia’s said they could not get quality treatment in the available private facilities in Taveta town.
“She could have been treated at Taveta Sub-County Hospital but due to the strike, we have been forced to take her here,” said Ms Monica Ndege.
She said she had seen scores of Taveta residents seeking treatment in Tanzania hospitals.
In Mombasa, services at the Coast General Hospital remained paralysed as doctors stayed away from the referral health facility.
