State threatens to fire all nurses

The Government has given striking nurses one week to resume duty or face the sack.

After a meeting, the Council of Governors, the Ministry of Health, the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC), and Public Service Commission (PSC) gave the health workers until Friday to end the strike.

"The council hereby puts all striking nurses on notice to return to work by September 8, 2017. All nurses who will not have returned to work by the stipulated date will stand sacked," the Council of Governors (CoG) said.

CoG Chairman Josephat Nanok said the collective bargaining agreement (CBA) as demanded by nurses cannot be implemented in its current form.

"The nurses' strike is illegal. It is notable that the nurses went on strike while the negotiations on their CBA were taking place. This was an act of bad faith," the Turkana governor said.

The council assured the nurses who will return to work before the deadline that they would not be victimised.

"There will be no victimisation of the nurses who participated in the strike. Counties will withdraw all show-cause letters issued before this date and pay all unpaid salaries," he said.

However, should this not happen, the Government said all counties will advertise the positions of the nurses and move to hire new ones on contract basis.

"The CoG has approved that a generic advert be generated by the secretariat of the council on behalf of all the counties while payment of salaries to striking nurses will be stopped immediately," Nanok added. He was flanked by Health Cabinet Secretary Cleopa Mailu, PSC Chairperson Margaret Kobia, SRC Chief Executive Anne Gitau, and more than 30 governors.

On Wednesday representatives of the nurses' union walked out of a meeting convened by CoG to try to iron out pending issues, leading to yesterday's ultimatum.

Elsewhere, counties have made a U-turn over the ongoing mass sackings of employees and promisesd to follow due process.

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