Kiambu clinical officers on Friday staged a demonstration in Kiambu town, where they demanded for their grievances to be addressed. The strike enters 74 days since the health workers took the industrial action.
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00:00The people united shall never be defeated.
00:07The people united shall never be defeated.
00:30The people united shall never be defeated.
01:00The people united shall never be defeated.
01:25As Kenya Union of Clinic Officers, we are doing our 74th day on strike.
01:31And we are on this strike to protect the professional dignity.
01:35To protect the professional respect.
01:38Because we are having our members in this county
01:43who are being employed under very discriminative and exploitative contracts.
01:49And they are being called cash workers.
01:52Sometimes they have to wait for salaries for six months.
01:57We also have a county government that we don't understand.
02:01There is a court order that they cannot intimidate,
02:04they cannot threaten, they cannot victimize
02:07or even start disciplinary processes during this strike.
02:11But this county government has decided to be in contempt of orders
02:15and withhold salaries for our clinic officers.
02:19And so today we are here to fight for the children of Kiambu.
02:23Us as Kiambu County, we have met almost all their demands.
02:28Because when they talk of health insurance,
02:35all our workers in the county are in a scheme.
02:42There is a scheme that serves the whole county.
02:44Where even me as Waziri, I am in that scheme.
02:48Every worker in the county is in that scheme.
02:50And even health care workers, we have them in that scheme.
02:54So even when they talk of, there is another demand that they are demanding for promotions.
02:58As a county last year, we promoted more than 700 health care workers.
03:07His Excellency, from the time he came in,
03:10he oversaw promotion of more than 700 health care workers,
03:15including clinic officers who were promoted last year, 2023.
03:20So as a county, we have been giving those promotions and resignations.
03:25At the moment, the clinic officers have kept away completely from our facilities.
03:31And therefore, we are operating at a very minimal level
03:37where we are using only those clinic officers who we have hired, the facility has hired.
03:46Those are the clinic officers who are serving in our outpatient department
03:50and also in critical areas like maternity.
03:56So when we come to surgical operations,
04:01at the moment they are almost completely paralyzed.
04:06And it is my appeal that the clinic officers,
04:10they heed the call of His Excellency, the Governor,
04:14and they come back to work because we have got an agreement with them
04:18that they work for us and we compensate them for the work that they do.
04:24And even the court declared that there should be some level,
04:29they should make sure that there is some level of functionality in the hospitals,
04:34that they should attend to emergencies,
04:37that they should make sure that there is some degree of functionality in all the hospitals,
04:44even if they are on strike.