Africa-Press – Uganda. Health workers in Yumbe District, who participated in the just concluded accelerated mass Covid-19 vaccination campaign have not been paid their allowances.
During the evaluation of the Covid-19 vaccination campaign on Wednesday, the health workers castigated the Ministry of Health, and that of Finance for their failure to remit funds meant for the campaign in time.
Mr Rasul Drajiga, the assistant Chief Administrative Officer in-charge of health, said they were not able to pay allowances for the health workers in time because remittance of funds for the vaccination campaign delayed.
“We were given figures of money to be spent, including prepared budgets using our Integrated Financial Management System (IFMS) and these funds must hit our accounts in the normal way using the system,” he said.
He said they are expecting a warranty on these funds so that they can make the necessary requisitions.
Yumbe District was allocated about Shs275m for the campaign.
The angry workers are now demanding explanations over the delay.
Ms Kadimala Candiru, the acting chief finance officer, however, said out of the money allocated for the vaccination campaign, Shs220m has been remitted to the district account and the balance of Shs55m has been withheld pending accountability of the first release.
“As this year comes to an end, we are yet to prepare our six months’ accounts report, so it’s not going to be easy to pay the health workers within this period,” she said.
She added: “We may pay the health workers in January. This is the assurance I want to give because we already have the money on the accounts.”
Mr Abdulmutwalib Asiku, the district chairperson, said it is unfortunate that the Ministry of Health came up with the vaccination programme without giving funds in time.
“Our health workers have been starving throughout this period of the campaign. I have been imagining how people involved in the campaign have been surviving because someone is deployed to a faraway place and stays there for the whole day hungry,” he added.
The district health officer, Dr Alfred Yayi, said part of the money has been retained over accountability issues.
Mr Peter Otelu Wandera, the Covid-19 vaccination national supervisor in the Ministry of Health, said despite the challenges, the health workers in the district were able to produce good results.
Yumbe District managed to vaccinate a total of 183,374 people in the accelerated vaccination campaign that lasted nine days.
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