Employees of the National Health Insurance Fund (NHIF) will be required to reapply for jobs when the 57-year-old State agency is divided into three units as part of planned reforms to make it more efficient.
In the transitional clauses of the Social Health Insurance Bill 2023, which seeks to disband NHIF and create a Social Health Authority to administer three funds, it is stated that the new Authority will take over all NHIF assets but will only absorb its workers based on merit.
NHIF employees who want to work for the Social Health Authority, which will oversee three funds—the primary healthcare fund, the healthcare fund, and the emergency, chronic, and critical illness fund—will have to reapply.
“The board of the Social Health Authority — shall competitively recruit and appoint its staff —- subject to the approved staff establishment and on such terms and conditions of service as may be determined by the board,” reads the bill in part.
“The staff of the Fund [NHIF] are eligible to apply for the positions advertised by the authority and may be considered for appointment where they are suitably qualified for the positions advertised.”
The NHIF employs over 1,800 people, and it is unclear how many people will work for the three funds that will succeed it if the bill is passed.
According to the Bill, NHIF employees who are not appointed by the authority must either retire or be redeployed elsewhere.
The three funds will be used by the government to run the Universal Healthcare (UHC) programme, which aims to provide affordable healthcare to all Kenyans.
