Governors warned against rewarding health workers without following the law

The Salaries and Remuneration Commission has asked governors not to reward health workers without following due process.

Through a letter addressed to Council of Governors chairperson Wycliffe Oparanya, SRC referred to Machakos Governor Alfred Mutua who decided to reward health workers in his county with allowances.

SRC said due process was not followed and the move might cause inequity in remuneration across the health sector in the counties, leading to instability in the sector.

“It is important to recognize that the National Government is currently raising funds to facilitate the fight against the pandemic.

“In light of scarce resources, it is prudent to use the available resources in the protection of the health workers by way of providing the much needed PPEs,” read the statement in part.

On Wednesday, Mutua announced that he will reward health workers in his county due to their sacrifices in COVID-19.

Mutua said the workers would be divided into three groups and will earn Sh20,000, Sh10,000 and Sh5,000 respectively.

Health professionals in the Machakos COVID-19 Surveillance team doing door to door monitoring of patients will pocket Sh20,000 while non-professional surveillance team members will get Sh10,000.

Other professional health workers - doctors, nurses, clinical officers etc will receive Sh 10,000 while supportive health worker cadres will receive Sh5000.

The governor stated that the allowances will be handed out from April and will continue for three months.

“Machakos already has 122 isolation beds spread over 9 sub counties and we are procuring more items to ensure we are ready to keep our people alive.

“The health workers who will be working in isolation wards will also receive additional allowances equivalent to that of the surveillance teams. In addition to the allowances, we are ensuring that we are providing adequate masks to all health workers,” said the governor.

Adding: “The allowances we are giving our health workers are just a token of appreciation based on what we can afford so as to show them that we care and we will continue supporting them and ensuring we have the right equipment, commodities and environment to keep them safe.”