Alleged neurosurgeon was also fired in Zimbabwe and Botswana for similar offences

NYUNYI Wambuyi Katumba, the alleged neurosurgeon who was struck off the roll by the Health Professions Council of South Africa in December, is a serial con artist.

Just a month after he was fired by three South African hospitals for fake qualifications, it turns out that Katumba, originally from Congo, was also fired in Zimbabwe and Botswana for similar offences.

His former employer, Steve Biko Academic Hospital in Pretoria, now also wants him thrown out of the country.

"The work permit given to him by Home Affairs was on the strength that he was a qualified neurosurgeon," Steve Biko chief executive Ernest Kenoshi said.

Authorities in Zimbabwe and Botswana said Katumba was kicked out of government employment because of shoddy work and poor performance. He then came to work in South Africa and was registered by the HPCSA as a neurosurgeon.

It is not clear how the HPCSA registered Katumba as the body was supposed to have investigated and verified his qualifications.

His enrolment is also questionable in that all foreign qualified medical practitioners are supposed to write an entry exam which is equivalent to the final-year medical qualification.

HPCSA spokeswoman Bertha Peter-Scheepers confirmed that Katumba was struck off the roll after he failed to prove that he was a qualified neurosurgeon.

Asked why Katumba was registered as neurosurgeon while he did not have the proper qualifications, Peter-Scheepers said officials who could comment on the issue were still on holiday.

Some of the hospitals Katumba had worked at include Steve Biko Academic, Mediclinic Medforum in Pretoria and Chris Hani-Baragwanath in Soweto.

Katumba was fired after the hospitals he had worked for received a letter of erasure from the HPCSA.

Katumba worked for two years under extended probation as a specialist neurosurgeon, said Kenoshi.

"We appointed him after he produced a certificate of registration with the HPCSA, but our assessment of his performance during his initial one-year probation period persuaded us to extend it by another year for closer assessment and observation. After two years of probation, we decided to fire him," Kenoshi said.

Johanna More, chief executive at Bara, said she was not aware that Katumba had been fired from Steve Biko Academic Hospital when he was appointed.

More said they were glad that they had noticed early enough that Katumba was a fake and fired him. "He has never been involved in any major operation in this hospital," she said.