Health officials battle without furniture, internet and stationery

WITH missing doorknobs and a shortage of working equipment, Tshwane’s regional district health office in Mabopane has spent at least a year looking more like an office equipment graveyard than a district health office. But that is set to change, say health officials.

Situated next to the Mabopane railway station, the office serves the densely populated areas of Mabopane, Soshanguve, Pretoria North, Ga-Rankuwa, Hammanskraal, Rooiwal, Winterveld and Dilopye.

Last year, Tshwane residents began to complain about what they said was the office’s derelict condition.

Without proper signage, security guards have to direct visitors to the main entrance, where a dusty front desk sat without a receptionist.

“I don’t know who to talk to,” said Lazarus Thandzo, who tried to lodge a complaint at the office last year. “I feel like I’m being sabotaged by the officials I am trying to report to about the bad treatment I have been receiving at my local clinic.”

Office workers wouldn’t speak on record due to fear of victimisation, but they voiced their frustrations about the office anonymously.

One administrative staff member said staff were expected to operate without working computers or internet access.

She also said that while they regularly reported their challenges to the district Department of Health, they seldom got a response. Requesting resources from the district office was an exercise in frustration, she added.

“We wait six months for stationery,” said one staff member. “Our office chairs and tables are old and broken and haven’t been replaced for years.”

A year later, staff gripes continue as administrative staff complain that they have gone three months without photocopying paper or an internet connection.

Sello Moila is a Winterveld Clinic committee volunteer. When Healthe News and the Pretoria News visited the office recently, he had been called in to take part in a clinic staff member’s disciplinary hearing.

He said he had spent 30 minutes wandering around the building looking for someone to point him in the direction of the meeting.

“To be honest, the passages are scary to go door-to-door knocking,” Moila said.

Gauteng Department of Health spokesman Chris Maxon said the department leases the office space, but they would soon be relocating to the previous nurses’ residence on the grounds of Dr George Mukhari Academic Hospital.

The move is expected not only to improve working conditions for regional staff, but also to save the department money. – Health-e News