Just a day after Opposition MPs unearthed several shocking failures at the Mulago National Referral Hospital, a senior staff at the hospital, in a rather controversial move, put out a public notice calling on all staff to send through him their personal complaints and grievances so he can personally present them to President Yoweri Museveni, for action.
Fredrick Kunya, a Senior Nursing Officer in the Orthopeadic Department, on Friday woke up with a rather strange thought, putting out on all the hospital notice boards a signed notice which the Hospital Executive Director, Dr. Baterana Byaruhanga, said he was not aware.
When Kunya was asked by the Office of the Public Relations Department why he had placed the announcement without informing the Diretor’s office, he said some of the problems that have to be exposed affect the director’s office.
The notice addressed to all staffs of the hospital read in part, “Please note that it is a collective effort to restore the glory, purpose, mandate, vision and core values of this hospital. In order to avoid bureacracy, manipulation, falsification, inaccuracies, omissions, you are advised to write the challenges problems and requirements to His Excellency Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, the Presdient of the Republic of Uganda. He wants to hear from the lowest man.”
The notice statest that all the staffs who write to him should do so in confidence and that all their grievances would be treated with the urgency they deserve.
Dr Baterana directed his officers to remove all the notices by Kunya saying he had not been contacted of the process.
Kunya later accused the top management of the hospital of letting down the staff as well as lacking the will to change the situation at the hospital. He said the referral hospital is supposed to be a national pride but that its glory has gone down the drain.
Kunya said he has previously communicated the plight of the hospital to the presdient but that no decisions were taken at that time. He said that issues of health concern life and must not be taken lightly or taken based on bureaucracy.
He called for unity across the country on matters pertaining to the health of the country if tangible results are going to be achieved.
