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Following the closure of the hospital, the Kenya Red Cross said it had evacuated stranded expectant mothers to the Kenyatta National Hospital and Mama Lucy Hospital/FELIX MAGARA

Kenya

Strike forces closure of Pumwani Maternity Hospital

Following the closure of the hospital, the Kenya Red Cross said it had evacuated stranded expectant mothers to the Kenyatta National Hospital and Mama Lucy Hospital/FELIX MAGARA

Following the closure of the hospital, the Kenya Red Cross said it had evacuated stranded expectant mothers to the Kenyatta National Hospital and Mama Lucy Hospital/FELIX MAGARA

NAIROBI, Kenya, Sep 10 – Pumwani Maternity Hospital has been closed indefinitely after employees boycotted duty in the ongoing strike by Nairobi County Government workers.

Following the closure of the hospital, the Kenya Red Cross said it had evacuated stranded expectant mothers to the Kenyatta National Hospital and Mama Lucy Hospital.

A woman seeking post-natal care told Capital FM News: “I had brought my child to the clinic and found it closed. I wanted him to be weighed but that was not possible. Doctors should be given their dues so that they can come back to work.”

“I came here at 8am with my child who had a problem with his leg but now I have gone home,” another stated.

And as the city continued to feel the bite of the striking workers on the sixth day, Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero has now sought the intervention of the Labour Ministry to help broker a truce.

This followed Monday’s ruling by the Industrial Court which rejected Kidero’s plea that the County Workers be held in contempt for going on strike.

The City County stated that it has lost millions of shillings in revenue in various sectors, including parking as explained by the Head of Car Park Tom Tinega.

“This is a situation where any minute you lose and every hour you lose… that money is not being collected anytime soon and this is really affecting us,” he stated.

Tinega told Capital FM News that a few of the parking attendants who resumed work have been unable to perform their duties due to harassment from their colleagues.

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“We actually try to get to do our work very early and try to do what we can. We lose a lot if we are disrupted for about six hours,” he pointed out.

The workers want the county authority to honor a Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) struck last year that seeks to award them between 40 to 60 percent increase in their perks.

They had stated that they would not go back to work until the CBA is fully implemented.

Kidero on the other hand contended that they had no part in the agreement and therefore cannot implement it.

He stated that the bargaining agreement was entered into by the workers and the national government, and the county government was neither a party nor can it legally implement it.

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