Online Reporter
Sikhumbuzo Moyo
A few months after decentralising the nurse training recruitment process, Government has ordered that 75 percent of recruited students must come from the district or province where the training school is located.
The move aims to promote local representation, reduce external influence, and curb corruption, following reports that some aspiring students were paying as much as $1 000 to secure placements.
During a question-and-answer session in Parliament on Tuesday, Dangamvura legislator Prosper Mutseyami asked what measures the Ministry had put in place to address complaints that some regions had not had a single student recruited into the nursing fraternity.
Health and Child Care Deputy Minister Sleiman Kwidini said the Ministry had acted swiftly, decentralising the recruitment process and ensuring that 75 percent of students recruited from each area are locals.
“As far as the Ministry is concerned, we have decentralised nurse training. Each region has more than two schools of nursing. After that, we have implemented a quota system where 75 percent of the students recruited from those areas are locals,” said Deputy Minister Kwidini.
More than 100 000 aspiring trainee nurses apply for placements across the country’s training schools each year, despite the limited capacity of around 1 200 available slots.
Official figures show that two of Zimbabwe’s largest training institutions, Sally Mugabe and Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals in Harare, receive an average of 5 000 and 8 000 applications per intake, yet their combined enrolment capacity is only 80 students. Notably, these schools have two intakes annually.
Other training facilities, including Mpilo Central Hospital, United Bulawayo Hospitals, and Ingutsheni Psychiatric Hospital in Bulawayo, can accommodate about 40 students each year.
Bongani Ndlovu