Rundu — Nurses at the Rundu Intermediate Hospital are unhappy the health facility filled a vacancy of a chief registered nurse at the maternity ward without advertising the post.
They are also not happy the hospital did not appoint one of the nurses that have worked in the ward for decades but chose one from Usakos state hospital.
Several nurses called New Era to air their grievances.
“While we have been waiting for the vacancy to be advertised last week, we were introduced to our new chief registered nurse, which surprised all of us,” said one of the nurses, who refused to be identified.
According to the disgruntled health worker, she has been at the maternity ward for years and was eager to apply once the post was advertised.
“What the hospital management did wasn’t good. Such actions bring frustration to staff – and it is demoralising; why not advertise the post and let us compete for it fairly? Are they saying all of us in this ward are incompetent? They need to explain,” said another aggrieved nurse at the hospital’s maternity ward.
Senior human resource practitioner at the hospital Elia David defended the appointment.
He claimed the panel that was interviewing candidates in February this year saw it fit that since two candidates performed an average score of 87% and 78.20% for their overall performance, they then decided that the second-best candidate, who was by then a senior registered nurse at Usakos hospital, should be recommended to fill the unadvertised position of chief registered nurse of the maternity ward. “According to the panel’s recommendation, since the two candidates performed exceptionally well above 78%, the interviewing committee recommended both candidates for the two posts of chief registered nurse grade 6,” he said.
“The human resource practitioners just facilitated the interviews; the panel made their decisions and recommendations, which they sent to the executive director for endorsement since they noted it was an urgent vacancy that needed to be filled urgently.”