Hundreds of junior staffers of the Kenya Medical Supplies Authority (KEMSA) will know their employment fate in a couple of days.
This is after the general notice of redundancy which had been extended to July 11 elapsed, KEMSA CEO Terry Ramadhani told a local daily.
While extending the notice of redundancy from July 6 to July 11, Ramadhani had promised to keep workers engaged in the whole redundancy exercise, an exercise that could see innocent junior staffers lose their jobs.
The looming staff layoffs at the drug agency have created tension among workers with junior employees feeling targeted for what they describe as “mistakes” that were committed by their seniors.
“The formal negotiation period with workers has lapsed. They will know the next course of action the authority will take in the next few days,” KEMSA said on Wednesday, July 13.
According to a report by Auditor General Nancy Gathungu which was submitted to lawmakers, KEMSA had 912 staff against an approved number of 341 in the year ended June 2020.
In the redundancy notice sent to all workers, the staff were required to re-apply for their jobs and those who emerge successful were expected to know their fate in September.
The lay-offs are part of a ‘clean-up’ exercise after the COVID-19 billionaires’ scandal where EACC flagged an irregular procurement of COVID-19 equipment valued at Ksh6.3 billion.