Doctor sues SRC for dishing out car grants to MCAs just after denying medics risk allowances

A Kenyan doctor has sued the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) over the decision to approve a car grant for Members of County Assemblies (MCAs).

Dr. Magare Gikenye, a General Surgeon at Nakuru Level V Hospital, has named all the 47 county assemblies and their speakers, Council of Governors, National Treasury, Controller of Budget, Commission on Administration of Justice, and the Attorney-General as respondents in the suit.

The Senate, the National Assembly, Law society of Kenya, KMPDU and six others have been named as interested parties.

He wants the court to suspend SRC decision approving the conversion of car loans into car grants for MCAs and Speakers in the 47 counties pending the hearing and determination of the suit.

According to the doctor, SRC is biased and discriminating against healthcare workers and favouring MCAs based on perceived political importance in terms of convenience and status of the offices they hold and their role in popularizing the Building Bridges initiative and the Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill, 2020.

“It is not wrong for anybody including the President to campaign for a particular cause. The problem is the President using public funds as an inducement and the failure by SRC to perform its function hence throwing away its independence,” he says in court documents.

The doctor notes that the SRC Chairperson in April 2020 warned county governments against payment of risk allowances to health workers, including to the members of Kenya Medical Practitioners, Pharmacists and Dentists Union (KMPDU) over the issues of affordability, fiscal sustainability, equity and fairness to reject allowances to healthcare workers.

“This was at the height of COVID-19 (SAR COV-02) pandemic where health workers, who were and are front-liners workers against COVID-19 pandemic and had been exposed to real and existential threat to their lives and lives of their families,” he says in court documents.

The doctor also contends that that SRC has not told the public which law it has used to approve the conversion of car loans to car grants and has not subjected the same to public participation as enshrined in Article 118 of the Constitution.

He contends that the car grant was approved outside the approved budget which had already undergone public participation and approved in Parliament.