Quick Hits: Matatu fares & Boda Boda problems

   As inflationary forces march on, matatu fares have fallen victim to its money-fleecing ways. Fares have risen by 50% in all routes. Now a ride costs 30 bob, up from the usual 20 Shs.

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Friends, we all know Garissa has been growing by leaps and bounds lately but this growth has brought with it a whole new set of maladies. No, I'm not talking about drugs or excessively high property prices or the population boom. Its the Boda Boda industry and all the ailments that have come with it. The operators have no particular training and are the cause of many injuries and sometimes deaths.

A tipster e-mailed me about the recent death of a youngster after getting run-over by a Boda Boda. Another youth is in critical condition in the Garissa Provincial General Hospital after he was injured in a similar circumstance.

Its time these guys get dealt with.

Garissa General Hospital is a Disgrace

Waihinya Ngari e-mailed this complaint about Garissa General Hospital. Of course I edited it since I know my readership slightly better than he does but the overall message went something like this:

If anyone knows anyone important in the ministry of health and medical services please let them know that the x-ray division at the Garissa hospital is not even trying – especially the bespectacled guy who apparently recently went on a trip to Dadaab for self enrichment ventures (I know this because he spent like two hours total chatting with random visitors about it). While visiting the hospital I saw what patients at the hospital have to go through on a daily basis. There was the woman who had come in for two days straight to get a dental x-ray. The previous day the x-ray guy sent her home because he had to leave after a three hour lunch break. The next morning when she returned she was made to wait for more than two hours because the said guy had to help out a nurse’s pregnant friend who wanted to have an ultra sound done. The most annoying bit of it all is that the waiting area is right outside the guy’s office and so we could hear all their conversations. The said guy then took another hour doing some paperwork and chatting with friends who popped in about every fifteen minutes. Je, huu ni ungwana???I obviously got annoyed by all this and in my naivety dialed the hospital hotline which is listed under the poster with the costs of all the x-rays outside the doctor’s office. The lady on the other side casually told me that they would take care of the delay and backlog with the x-rays and immediately hung up. Nothing was done. And to imagine that these guys live on taxpayers’ money. I have contacted Mr. Anyang’ Nyong’o himself and I am still waiting to hear from him (Mr. Nyong’o is very good with email, the only other time I wrote him he wrote back within a week)
Sincerely,Ngari