Zim freezes trainee nurses’ recruitment

By Paidamoyo Chipunza

Government will suspend recruitment of trainee nurses with effect from May next year, Health and Child Care Secretary Dr Gerald Gwinji has said.

In an interview with our Harare Bureau, Dr Gwinji said this was necessitated by the need to standardise recruitment processes and procedures.

He said while recruitment has temporarily been suspended, nurse training will continue with groups already recruited.

“This is a temporary measure that we have put in place to suspend pre-recruitment for candidates who are coming into nurse training for May and September 2019 going forward.

“We just want to fine tune our policy and recruitment processes so that they are standard and uniform across our institutions.

“Therefore, we will be communicating by end of January going into early February to all institutions with regards to this so that the processes can then commence and continue,” said Dr Gwinji.

He said the groups would be subjected to new regulations to be availed in due course.

“Nurse training per se is not suspended. We have a group that will be taken in May but it will then be taken under the revised training regulations,” said Dr Gwinji.

All the training institutions have since been advised of the development.

“Please be informed that the recruitment of student nurses from May 2019 and beyond has been suspended. You should be informed of the next steps via a circular in due course,” read a memo addressed to all training institutions. The Chronicle