More than 600 employees at Kenya Medical Supplies Authority (Kemsa) may not be accepted back to work for lack of proper qualifications, it has now emerged.

Newly appointed Chief Executive Officer Terry Ramadhani Kiunge said an audit done last year established that most of the workers were not properly employed and many of them have been promoted unprocedurally.

Kiunge said out of slightly over 900 employees, only 341 are eligible to work for the national medicines supplier.

“We have established that the authority is dealing with employees that have multiple contracts and promotions with just written notes,” she claimed while addressing a pharmacists’ conference in Kwale, which closed its doors on Saturday.

Kiunge is today expected to share Kemsa three-pronged strategy, which she believes will transform Kemsa into a globally competitive drugs supplier. 

She is also expected flag off medicines for Makueni County valued at Sh37.3 million.

In November last year, the Kemsa board approved a move to have most of the 900 employees of the authority work from home, with others sent on compulsory leave. The move has caused jitters among employees, others who have already started to look for jobs elsewhere.

“It’s concerning to have a structure in place that doesn’t optimise the Terms of Reference (TORs) of most of the employees of the institution,” she noted.

Kiunge, who was controversially appointed as Kemsa’s substantive CEO, further stated that the authority doesn’t have people with the relevant qualities to operationalise the mandate it was created to deliver.

“We are focused on repositioning  Kemsa, and this involves re-engineering a system that looks at a holistic approach to the perennial challenges that has made it a loss making institution,” she said.

Appointment

The Pharmaceutical Society of Kenya (PSK) has challenged her appointment, stating she is not qualified for the position.

Some of the employees are also not happy with the appointment.

“How can she be involved in developing the TOR for the CEO position, resigned and be interviewed for the same office?” an employee who sought anonymity posed, and added; “for your information this is conflict of interest”.

As part of the ongoing re-organisation of the authority, Kiunge said the board had proposed to create two directorates.

“We will create a Health Products and Technologies Directorate headed by a qualified pharmacist,” she said.

She said the challenges at Kemsa does not help the institution to optimise its ability to deliver what it was created to do in line with the Kemsa Act. 

“Then you have a structure whereby the people responsible for the commodities are not necessarily responsible through the whole line, with the relevant technical capacity,” she said.