Doctors’ union officials yesterday chose to be jailed for one month rather than negotiate with the government within the next two weeks.
Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists’ Union secretary general Ouma Oluga said they cannot negotiate under duress and will serve their jail terms beginning January 26.
“We cannot negotiate with a noose on our necks,” he told striking doctors and students at Railways Club, Nairobi.
Oluga compared the seven officials to freedom campaigners such as Nelson Mandela, Jomo Kenyatta and Mahatma Gandhi, who were jailed.
“On [January] 26th if the government does not implement the collective bargaining agreement, hospitals will still be closed,” he told striking doctors and students.
Employment and Labour Relations Court judge Hellen Wasilwa sentenced the seven national officials to a one-month suspended sentence to give them time to negotiate with the government. She said the sentence will apply automatically if the strike is not called off by January 26.
The officials were sentenced for disobeying a December court order that declared the strike illegal.
“You now have a sentence hanging on your head… The ladies will be taken to Lang’ata Prison and the men Kamiti Prison,” Wasilwa said yesterday.
The officials are Oluga, deputy secretary general Chibanzi Mwachonda, chairman Samuel Oroko, vice chairman Titus Ondoro, treasurer Daisy Korir, assistant treasurer Evelyn Chege and Allan Ochanji.
About 3,500 doctors in public hospitals have been on strike for 40 days since December 5 last year, demanding implementation of the 2013 CBA they signed with the Ministry of Health.
However, on October 6, the Labour Court declared the document void because it lacks the input of the Salaries and Remuneration Commission and the county governments, which now employ 80 per cent of Kenyan doctors.
The CBA was also signed after health was fully devolved and the governors accused the national government of signing the pact illegally.
Justice Monica Mbaru ordered the union to negotiate a new CBA within 90 days, but officials called a strike.
The old CBA gives the lowest paid doctor, an intern, a monthly salary of Sh325,000, up from Sh127,000.
The government has offered them a 40 per cent pay hike, giving an intern a maximum monthly pay of Sh208,000, which unionists reject.
Yesterday, the national officials accused Justice Wasilwa of insulting doctors by calling them “sewage”.
The judge had likened the disobedience of court orders to the stench of sewage. “I will not hear you until you purge the contempt,” she said.
Oluga and other officials also accused the judge of lacking independence and reading from a script prepared by the government.
Oroko said private investors are behind the stalemate. “They want public hospitals to collapse so they can make more money,” he said.
Oroko said the union officials are ready to be imprisoned until their CBA is implemented.
“You take us to spend one month in jail, so what?” he said.