By Patricia Mollyne Mataga
Doctors on Wednesday finally called off their strike that was heading towards the third month.
The strike started late in March 2024. Since then, there has been efforts to address the issues raised, but all in vain, until May 8, 2024.
But while the strike is finally over, one thing was conspicuously missing in the return-to-wok formula signed by parties from the Kenya Medical Practitioners Pharmacists and Dentist Union, Ministry of Health and the Council of Governors (CoG) – medical interns salary.
Interns salary has been a key area of contention.
Doctors were demanding the Ksh206,000 contained in the 2017 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) while the government insisted they can only afford Ksh70,000.
On the return-to-wok formula, the medical interns salary issue was marked as pending.
In a media briefing after the strike was called off, KMPDU Secretary General Davji Attelah said the matter was still subject to a court’s decision.
“As we take this, I must say that one of the fundamental issues, that is, the matter of doctor interns, is still pending. This matter was filed in court in Eldoret,” Atellah said.
With the two sides failing to agree on the matter, KMPDU said they had agreed that posting of the interns be stopped, for the time being.
“The interns will have to wait a little bit longer. We have agreed on a 60 days period that they will not be posted, but we’ll be having conversations on this issue. It then means that as this matter in court is ongoing, we’ll also be having conversations,” added the KMPDU boss.
In the meantime, medical services in public hospitals are expected to be back to normal.
Doctors play a critical role, especially in handling specialized cases which have faced a challenge since the strike begun.
