Uhuru appoints Mary Mwadime as new KEMSA board Chairperson

By James Macharia

President Uhuru Kenyatta has appointed Mary Chao Mwadime as the new Chairperson of Kenya Medical Supplies Authority (KEMSA) board to replace the stepping out Senator James Kembi Gitura.

In the same gazette notice dated April 28, the president has revoked the appointment of Kembi Gitura and now the new appointee will serve in the docket for the coming three years, taking effect as from April 30.

Also in the notice, the Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe has named Robert Nyarango, Capt. (Rtd) Lawrence Wahome and Terry Kiunge Ramadhani to the Board of Directors of the Kenya Medical Supplies Authority for a three-year term as from April 30.

Similarly, the appointments of Bibiana K. Nijue, Timothy Mwololo Waema, Joel Onsare Gesuka and Dorothy Atieno Aywak were revoked.

This comes shortly after the most vicious graft hitter the authority, with investigations into the 7.8 billion saga still ongoing.

Consequentially, Gitura was posted to the Communications Regulatory Authority at the beginning of this month.

While speaking on his stand over the current ARVs standoff between Kenya and the United States, US Secretary of State Anthony J Blanken likened the KEMSA graft to an elephant in a house.

The standoff was as a result of USAID demanding a different US based company, chemonics international to be the distributor before the release of the consignment.

As per Blinken, USAID’s main objective on ARVs disbursement was transparency and accountability on KEMSA’s part and they discussed so with President Kenyatta.

“What we discussed about today was making sure as KEMSA was being reformed nothing fell through the cracks, that we had the ability together to make sure that our assistance continued uninterrupted, so that our people in need of what we’re providing didn’t go without it,” said Blinken in part of his statement

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