Nationwide strike by clinical officers entered its eighth day on Tuesday with union leaders hardening their stance and announcing countrywide demonstrations on January 7 as pressure mounted on national government and county bosses to honour court-backed agreements.

The Kenya Union of Clinical Officers (KUCO) said the strike, which began on December 23, was lawful and aimed at enforcing a return-to-work agreement signed on July 8 last year after a seven-month stoppage and subsequently registered in court.

Speaking at Kisumu County Referral Hospital on Tuesday, KUCO Secretary General George Gibore said the union had been forced back to industrial action after the Council of Governors (CoG) failed to implement timelines contained in the court-sanctioned deal.

“We are not joking. We are enforcing a court order. Everything we agreed on last year became a court order and must be implemented,” he said. He accused the Council of Governors of deliberately frustrating clinical officers instead of amicably resolving what he termed long-standing administrative issues that can be fixed within hours if there was good faith.

At the heart of the standoff, he said, is a Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) that has been under negotiation for more than eight years and two full negotiation cycles but remain unsigned. Gibore said the return-to-work agreement required the CBA to be concluded within 90 days with only one item outstanding at the time.

However, he said, the CoG has neither convened talks nor shown any willingness to finalise the process.

“We are not willing to cross into a third cycle of a CBA still under negotiation. Our employer simply does not care that services are disrupted,” he said.

The union also raised concerns over failure by counties to fully implement Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) pay reviews. Gibore said counties only effected phases one and two of SRC-approved salary adjustments, leaving phases three and four unpaid even as the national government rolls out phase five.

He said counties including Mombasa, Baringo, Kisii, Kitui and Meru had confirmed availability of funds but were instructed by the CoG not to proceed.

“In Kitui, phase three had been implemented for three years before the county was reprimanded by the Council of Governors and ordered to stop,” he said.

KUCO further warned of looming job losses among Universal Health Coverage (UHC) staff.

Although the National Treasury and the Ministry of Health released funds and salaries were adjusted, counties, he said, have failed to issue letters confirming workers on permanent and pensionable terms.

About 10,000 health workers risk losing their jobs when current contracts lapse between March and May next year and may not be budgeted for in the next financial year if the issue remains unresolved.

Gibore also accused counties of deploying interns to attend to patients during the strike, warning that this endangers both patients and interns, who are not qualified to independently offer clinical services.

He urged patients to ensure they are attended to by properly trained personnel. He said the CBA has already been fully negotiated, approved by the Treasury and cleared by the SRC and is only awaiting signature by the Health Cabinet Secretary.

“The SRC is the only constitutionally mandated body to determine pay. That decision has been made. What remains is adoption and signature,” he said.

KUCO Deputy Secretary-General Austin Oduor said the government had invited the strike through inaction, noting that the Health Cabinet Secretary had claimed he had not seen the CBA despite it having been in his office for nearly two months.

He said clinical officers handle about 90 per cent of patients in Kenya and dismissed claims that the strike involves only a few workers.

“We are more than 30,000 clinical officers. On January 7, all of us will be in the streets,” Oduor said.

The clinicians, he declared, have planned to march to Afya House, the Salaries and Renumeration Commission offices, parliament and the Delta House where the CoG secretariat is housed to protest until their demands are met.

He said clinical officers would not return to work until the CBA is signed and registered in court, warning that further delays would deepen the health crisis.

“This strike is about an employer unwilling to do what they are supposed to do. We will not go back to work until everything agreed upon is implemented in full,” he said.

• A Tell Media / KNA report / By Chris Mahandara