Ekusileni Medical Centre staff recruitment begins

Sharda Group of Institutions (SGI), an Indian investor identified by the Government to open Ekusileni Medical Centre, has started recruiting staff in preparation for the re-opening of the hospital.

Dr Raja Dutta's office has started advertising the jobs in India and said it will move to Zimbabwe later.

A brainchild of the late Vice President, Dr Joshua Nkomo, Ekusileni Medical Centre has been closed for over 18 years.

In an interview yesterday Dr Dutta who is the SGI chief operating officer, confirmed that recruitment had started but could not give an exact date for the re-opening of hospital, saying it depended on the Ministry of Health and Child Care.

"Recruitment is underway for personnel to work at Ekusileni Hospital but I can't give further details because it's confidential. The date of re-opening of the hospital will be decided by the Ministry of Health," said Dr Dutta.

The chairman of the taskforce running Ekusileni Medical Centre, Dr Nyasha Masuka, referred questions to SGI while Minister of Health and Child Care Minister Dr Obadiah Moyo could not be reached for comment.

According to an advert by SGI, Ekusileni is hiring general practitioners, critical care doctors, surgeons, paediatrics, specialist doctors as well as nurses and technicians for all departments.

The hospital is also hiring a medical director and superintendent, support service manager, marketing managers, hospital administrator, front office manager, Electronic data processing (EDP) manager, HR manager and executive, receptionist, assistant manager and marketing executives.

SGI also advertised for a purchase officer and assistant, cashier, physiotherapist, Medical Records (MRD) officer, pharmacist and accountant. SGI has interests in health care and owns a university teaching medical sciences, dental sciences, engineering and creative arts among other disciplines in India.

Last year, SGI president and chairman Mr Ashok Daryani and Mr Pradeep Kumar Gupta accompanied by their technical team toured the hospital and expressed satisfaction with the infrastructure, saying it was well maintained.  They, however, said there were some minor structural changes and additional structures needed at the hospital to suit the group's expectations. Ekusileni Medical Centre was shut down in 2001 and several efforts have been made to re-open the hospital to no avail.

President Mnangagwa toured the hospital last year and said Government was committed to its re-opening.

In 2015, a South African firm, Phodiso Holdings, was engaged to equip the hospital and the deal was expected to be implemented by April of the same year but  it collapsed.

The hospital was closed after it was discovered that equipment worth millions of dollars acquired by the Zimbabwean Health Care Trust (ZHCT) which was supposed to run the hospital, was obsolete.

The health facility was initiated as a joint venture between ZHCT and Netcare, a South African healthcare group that provides private healthcare in both South Africa and the United Kingdom.

A super structure development fund was set up which saw NSSA, ZHCT and the Mining Industry Pension Fund (MIPF) becoming partners as developers. MIPF, however, later pulled out of the project, leaving NSSA to develop it on its own and become the sole owner of the property as ZHCT failed to contribute towards its construction.