A meeting between Health Cabinet Secretary Aden Duale, Public Service Commission (PSC) Chief Executive Officer Anthony Muchiri, and the Social Health Authority (SHA) succeeded in concluding the status of staff of the defunct National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF).
In the meeting on Friday, May 23, Duale announced that all staff under the defunct NHIF will to continue to serve in SHA for an additional six months. Alternatively, the NHIF staff would continue serving under SHA until the Authority completed its recruitment process.
“Convened a consultative meeting with the Public Service Commission, led by Chairperson Amb. Antony Muchiri and the Social Health Authority (SHA), chaired by Dr. Abdi Mohamed, to address the transition of staff from the defunct National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF),” Duale stated.
“The Commission issued a firm directive: all former NHIF staff will continue to serve under SHA for an additional six months, or until SHA completes its recruitment process, whichever comes first,” the CS added.
Also, Duale disclosed that staff who requested redeployment to other government agencies were to be reassigned immediately, with the process set to begin next week.
“Staff who have lawfully requested redeployment to other public service institutions will be reassigned immediately, with the redeployment process set to begin next week,” he noted.
The latest puts a definitive end to the discourse on the state of NHIF staff who have been clamouring to be employed in the new system. However, it still puts question marks on whether the workers will be permanently absorbed, as it follows a previous directive by SHA to extend the contracts of NHIF workers by six months.
In November 2024, former SHA CEO Robert Ingasira announced that former NHIF employees were to be onboarded to SHA for the next six months as the authority got its house in order.
This came after growing discontent amongst the 1,700 NHIF employees who mulled over the uncertainty of their futures amidst the transition into the new health system. The employees claimed that their interests should be looked after even as the government moved to the new health funding model.
At the time, in an anonymous interview with Citizen TV, an employee revealed that a majority of NHIF employees were currently experiencing anxiety, fear, and uncertainty due to the situation.
SHA had initially promised to integrate them into the new structure, but recent developments indicated that the new health authority was to retain only a limited number of employees and had imposed stringent conditions for their selection.
Even so, Duale maintained that the new development marked a decisive step in ensuring stability, legal compliance and uninterrupted service delivery as the country transitions to a fresh health insurance regime under the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) framework.
