Delayed Salaries and Lack of Promotion Could Plunge Lamu Health Sector into Strike

By Fumo Mzalendo

Email, thecoastnewspaper@gmail.com

These grievances have forced the medical practitioners to down their tools and joined the list of other counties facing similar work-related disputes.

The medics, comprising nurses and clinical officers drawn from various county health facilities in the county, opted for industrial action after the county government failed to meet their demands on the expiry of a 14-day ultimatum.

Speaking in Mokowe today (September 2, 2025) during the protest, county health Workers Union chairman Stephen Ewoyi stated that the strike had been drawn following the government’s reluctance to address long standing issues affecting health workers there.

“The current administration seems to have shut the door to addressing the issue of promotions among health workers for which, a large section of specialised medics seem to have stagnated at one job group for more than 10 years.”

According to him the medics’ demands for prompt payment of their salaries and address promotions seemed to have fallen on deaf ears despite assurances by handlers of county government promising to address their concerns since last year.

He said that career progression among Lamu medics seemed to have become virtually non-existent with very few being afforded the opportunity to further their studies in a bid to improve on their service delivery within their various health departments.

“Health care workers are demanding for fairness and equal chances for career opportunities and immediate redesignation to all medics who qualify.”

His secretary general Erick Otieno echoed the same sentiments highlighting the county’s failed to properly accord medics permanent and pensionable terms in preference for terms that were meant to subjugate the health workers.

He said that the contract terms that medical workers in Lamu were being subjected to as early as this year have been unfair, and go against the good faith in ensuring that Universal Healthcare Coverage was achieved by ensuring good working conditions and terms for medical workers.

The secretary noted that the county has persistently failed to ensure timely payment of health workers salaries with most medics going for three months without pay.

“It is unfortunate that the county government has reneged on its promise of ensuring that medics are paid in a timely fashion given that they have also failed to implement the six percent salary increment with arrears since the agreement was struck by the Salaries and Remuneration Commission in June 1st 2024.”

On her part, the union treasurer Wahida Baile said that there was need for the county to actively engage the health workers in a bid to avert a health crisis in there.

“The county government should not only take pride in the infrastructure that they peddle to the public but also work towards ensuring that the human resource personnel behind the success of achieving Universal Healthcare coverage in Lamu are adequately compensated and their concerns addressed,” she said.

Lamu deputy governor and CEC for medical services Dr Mbarak Bhajaj, in a statement, however, said that the health workers already know the county’s position that there were no funds for promotion or to address job stagnation.

However, he said the county administration remained open for dialogue on how to address the plight of the health workers adding that they were committed to ensure healthcare service delivery stays on course, despite the financial constraints that it was experiencing at the moment.