The doctors union has written to the Medical Association of Tanzania (MAT), asking it to delay the deployment of its members to Kenya by at least two months.
In a letter dated March 20, the Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) says the foreign doctors should not report to work until the Kenyan government signs two crucial documents that not only ended the 100-days doctors strike but also would address their employment concerns.
CBA
KMPDU says the Return to Work Formula and the Collective Bargaining Agreement as agreed on March 14, 2017 are yet to be assented to and implemented and “it would be appropriate” for their colleagues across the borders to wait.
In the letter, Secretary-General Ouma Oluga tells MAT President Obadia Nyongole that for past two years, doctors in Kenya have not had it easy.
“The Kenyan doctors have struggled to be employed by the Kenyan government, forcing a number to be rejected due to what the Kenyan government and the ministry of health termed as budget constraints,” he says.
“This formed part of the CBA dispute that led to the strike concluded a week ago.”
WELCOME
Dr Oluga explains to Dr Nyongole that as a result, there are “a number of Kenyan doctors yet to be employed in the public service of Kenya with the number expected to reach 1,400 by May 2017.”
“We have equally noted that even though both Kenya and Tanzania have wanting doctor: patient ratio, Tanzania trails Kenya and this it is unusual that Kenya would further drain Tanzania of 500 more doctors.”
The body adds that the Tanzanian government should be asked why it was not employing doctors and had instead opted to “export” them to Kenya.
But in another paragraph, KMPDU says they “shall warmly welcome and professionally induct the 500 Tanzania doctors, as and when, they will arrive in Kenya.”
NO JOBS
This is as Health Cabinet Secretary Cleopa Mailu said the foreign doctors would start working in Kenya—in the national, county and faith-based health facilities across the country—in the first week of April, and would be given two-to-three year contracts.
MAT seems to be siding with their Kenyan counterparts in the row.
Dr Nyongole, for instance, has demanded that the government scrap its plan to send 500 Tanzanian doctors to Kenya, The Citizen reports.
The government, he says, should first address the unemployment crisis newly qualified doctors were facing before thinking of sending medics outside the country.
EXPORT
But Tanzania Health Minister Ummy Mwalimu denied that the government was “exporting” doctors to Kenya, noting that what was being implemented was a bilateral agreement between the two countries initiated their heads of state.
“It was not therefore not necessary to involve all stakeholders in arriving at the decision to send the doctors to Kenya,’’ she said.
The minister added that the ministry would appoint a recruitment team which would consider the participation of MAT.
Source: Daily Nation
