Nurses union Sec-Gen Seth Panyako charged with creating disturbance

Kenya National Union of Nurses (KNUN) Secretary General Seth Panyako was Tuesday morning arraigned at the Milimani Law Courts for allegedly inciting nurses at Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) to go strike.

Panyako alongside two others; Joseph Wanyoike and Evans Mwendea Mwaluko were arraigned before Nairobi Chief Magistrate Francis Andayi and charged with creating disturbance and taking part in an unlawful assembly.

According to the charge sheet, the KNUN Secretary General is accused of “creating disturbance in a manner likely to cause a breach of peace by disrupting services at the Kenyatta National Hospital facility.”

The trio pleaded not guilty and were released on a personal bond of Ksh.50,000 each.

Magistrate Andayi, however, noted that the offence of causing disturbance is not one that requires one to be arraigned in court.

Panyako was arrested at the Kenyatta National Hospital where he was set to address union members in the wake of a strike triggered by an incident where a nurse was allegedly assaulted by an angry patient.

The doctors and nurses at the referral hospital had downed their tools to protest what they termed as their insecurity paralysing services at the health facility.