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"speaker_name": "Dr. Eseli",
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"content": "Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir. I wish to thank the Chairman of the Committee for giving me this chance to second this Motion on the Report of the Committee on the appointment of the CEO of the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital in Eldoret. It must be noted that the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital, Eldoret, serves a very wide catchment area which includes most of the western part of Kenya, the North Rift and all the way up to Turkana. In its current establishment, it is smaller than what is expected of it. It needs to be expanded and various other things to be done so that it can cater for these people. As a nation, we have failed to plan for our growing population. That is why we do not have adequate referral centres and adequate quality medical services. This, therefore, has been a major relief to the Kenyatta National Hospital, so that many patients end up at the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital without having to come all the way to Nairobi. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, however, the problems that are bedeviling the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital are also partly the making of this House in the sense that from the time we tabled this Report, it has taken the House Business Committee a very long time to schedule it for debate. Meanwhile the Moi Referral Hospital has continued to suffer to the extent that before the acting CEO was appointed, the hospital was virtually on its knees. It is imperative to note that the issue of the appointment of the CEO of the Moi Referral Hospital came up at a very emotive period when we were also looking at appointments of other CEOs in the country. The issue had become emotive, sometimes bearing some ethnic overtones whenever we discuss the appointments of CEOs of various bodies in the country. This was not just about the Ministry of Medical Services, but it had affected several other Ministries where other CEOs had been appointed. In the process, we have ended up sort of ethicizing very highly qualified professionals of this country such that whenever they are appointed, it carries an ethnic overtone which is very unfortunate especially for a hospital of the stature of the Moi Referral Hospital, Eldoret. The main problem with the appointment of the CEO of the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital is the statute that set it up, namely, the Legal Notice No.78 of 1998. It is so flawed that unless one is careful, you can easily tread on thin ground. It states specifically that the appointing authority for the CEO of the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital is the President of the Republic of Kenya. In that case then, any other appointments that are made by any other person other than the President will be null and void. Given the Coalition agreement, it means that the appointment has to be done by the President in consultation with the Prime Minister. I think that had not been looked at by the Board of the Hospital by the time the Ministry put in place the process of appointing the CEO. That is what has created the problem. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, as our conclusion says, we have recommended that we need to request that the President, therefore, holds urgent consultations with the Prime Minister and appoints a substantive CEO of the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital, Eldoret. The statute is so flawed that the Chair of the Board serves for three years while members of the Board serve for five years. It is an intricate thing that needs to be unpacked in the sense that when they state that the CEO of Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital should also be the principal of the College of Health Sciences of Moi University, Moi University does not have a college of health sciences. It has something similar but of a different name and does not have a principal. Already, that makes the statute so difficult to implement. So, we would urge that this statute be urgently amended and brought in line with the other statutes on hiring of CEOs in this country. Perhaps, it would be very important to note that some of the problems that bedevil this hospital could be traced back to the clashes after the last general election in the sense that on advertising for the CEO, the applications that are received are so few. The Board appears to think that this could be because many people are scared of applying for a job there. The Board felt that they were unable to source the right material for that hospital. It is an unfortunate situation. The Board that is tasked with national cohesion should step in very urgently and ensure that this does not happen to this hospital which serves a multi- ethnic population that covers most of Western and major parts of the Rift Valley provinces. This is a multi-ethnic population. It will be unfortunate if ethnicity was attached to the appointment of the CEO of the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, on the same process, it has come to pass that the issue of the appointment of the CEO of the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital has also gone into the public domain with the present political debate that goes on at public rallies, a political mood that I consider very toxic to this nation. Unfortunately, it is also starting to permeate into the appointment of the CEO. That is why there should be no further delay. The President and the Prime Minister should not delay any further. If they cannot do it themselves, then they should task the Ministry of Medical Services to urgently undertake the appointment of the CEO. They need to consult and appoint a CEO urgently, so that we can diffuse the situation that threatens one of the premium medical providers in this country. Unless we do that, Kenyatta National Hospital alone will not cope with the kind of work load that we have and the fact that the Ministry of Medical Services has not been adequately funded to ensure that provincial hospitals can perform the task of referral centres as they were destined to do. So long as the funding is not there for provincial hospitals, then centres like the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital, the Kenyatta National Hospital and the Russia Hospital in Kisumu become very key to health care in this country. Unless the two principals move expeditiously and get this problem over, then we will continue facing a problem in health care in this country. I would like to end by stating that it was not for the Committee to determine the suitability of the candidates. I do not consider that to be the mandate of the Committee. What we had been asked to do was not to decide the suitability of the candidates, but rather to look at the method of appointment and whether the methodology was correct and tallied with the statute that set up the hospital. In that, the Committee has fulfilled its mandate. We have not tried to look at the suitability or otherwise of the candidates who were involved in the recruitment, but rather to look at the methodology and give views that will help us move forward. The role of a Committee, apart from the oversight role, should also be facilitative to ensure that the respective Ministries can move forward without acrimony, so that we can work in cohesion to ensure that many of these things happen and we do not delay too much and end up with a situation like what we ended up with at the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital. With those few remarks, I wish to second the Motion."
}