This archive report was first published on 15 May 2020.
Published on May 15, 2020, the Kenya National Private Security Workers' Union has raised concerns over the 'discrimination' of private guards in the fight against Covid-19.
According to the union's Secretary General Isaac Adambwa, private guards are frontline workers who receive patients in hospitals and those gaining entry into every institution, and have now been tasked with checking their temperatures.
Adambwa said a spot check in Nairobi, Eldoret, and Kisumu revealed that security boxes in institutions have been converted to triage for checking temperatures, which is an extra duty for guards.
He emphasized that guards' roles include securing property and complementing police, and that they have been given additional roles as health workers without prior training.
Adambwa called on the government to consider guards when planning for allowances and to enforce the minimum wage policy to enable guards to afford basic needs.
He also faulted the Ministry of Health for ignoring guards, despite them being gazetted as essential service providers.
Adambwa said, 'We are not asking the government to budget for us, we only want the government to enforce the minimum wage policy to enable the guards afford basic needs. We cannot afford alcoholic sanitisers but the most effective way according to the Ministry of Health is washing hands with water and soap regularly that is possible to us.'
