For over three years, Kenyatta University (KU) has stood at a crossroads, its medical and health science students left training in under-equipped hospitals in Kiambu and Thika, while a world-class facility built on its own grounds remains out of bounds.

Vice Chancellor Prof Paul Wainaina has reignited a spirited push to return the Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral and Research Hospital (KUTRRH) to its original mission as the training hub for its health sciences students.

Wainana says students from the institution have been undergoing training in facilities in Kiambu and Thika, despite having a state-of-the-art facility within their institution.

“Students doing health programmes such as medicine, pharmacy, nursing, public health, and medical labs have been struggling in using sub-standard facilities in Kiambu and Thika.

“That affects the quality of education we offer—yet we have a state-of-the-art hospital right here, one built with students in mind,” the VC told the university community last week.

In 2021, when Legal Notice No. 39 converted KUTRRH into a state parastatal, KU lost its representation on the hospital board.

The Vice Chancellor and a member of the university council were removed, effectively stripping KU of any decision-making power.

This legal manoeuvre not only sidelined the university from managing the hospital but also cut off students from vital training access.

With his term set to end in less than a year, Prof. Wainaina has placed the hospital’s return high on his list of priorities.

“If by the time I retire, KUTRRH is back under the university’s care—training our students as it was meant to—I will feel accomplished,” he said.

Wainaina says while students of other universities are being trained in level six hospitals, theirs cannot. His sentiments were echoed by a representative in KU’s student congress for Health and Science.

“We are the only ones still confined to Level Five hospitals, most of which are under-resourced,” said Ochieng.

Despite repeated petitions and a ruling by the Senate Health Committee last year, which recommended that the university be reintegrated in KUTRRH’s management, progress has stalled.

“The Senate ruled that we should be given access to the facility immediately. It’s now been a year, and nothing has changed. We still can’t access what should be our hospital,” he said.

In its report, the committee led by Uasin Gishu Senator Jackson Mandago, called for the revocation of Legal Notice No. 39 of 2021, reinstatement of KU representation in hospital management, and the handover of the academic and training block to the KU School of Health Sciences.

“The committee recommends that the initial concept of KUTRRH as an education and research facility of KU be safeguarded through the revocation of Legal Notice No. 39 of 2021,” stated the committee’s report.

The hospital was to retain its mortuary within the block but allow KU to set up an anatomy laboratory—critical for medical training.

The struggle traces back to 2022, when a group of students submitted a formal petition demanding full access to the facility.

They argued that KUTRRH’s initial purpose had been hijacked by bureaucracy, at the expense of the students it was meant to serve.

But even with Senate support and student backing, the university’s efforts continue to face institutional inertia. What was envisioned as a bridge between academia and healthcare excellence has, for KU students, become a symbol of exclusion.