Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers Secretary General Akelo Misori addresses the media flanked by other officials in Nairobi on August 25, 2024.
A teachers’ union has suffered a major setback after the Registrar of Trade Unions failed to effect proposed constitutional changes.
Top officials of the Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) will now have to return to the drawing board to register far-reaching constitutional amendments passed during a chaotic Annual Delegates Conference (ADC) in Vihiga County last year.
Acting Registrar of Trade Unions Ann Kanake said overwhelming objections from a section of the officials and members informed her decision to reject the changes.
She asked the union’s officials, led by Secretary-General Akello Misori, National Chairman Omboko Milemba and National Treasurer Mwethi Njenga to respond to the avalanche of petitions filed by members rejecting the changes and manner they were tabled and adopted.
It is a major temporary win for embattled Assistant National Treasurer Ronald Tonui and Mr Sammy Chelanga, the secretary for tertiary institutions, who led various branch officials in opposing the changes.
Mr Tonui, who fellow national officials attempted to kick out but was reinstated by the Employment and Labour Relations Court, was barred from attending the ADC on December 20, 2024, along with various branch officials, who opposed the changes.
In a letter dated January 8, 2024, addressed to Kuppet, Ms Kanake said “the objections and issues so far raised are too numerous for the Registrar to ignore”. “Kindly note that we have received numerous objections to the registration of the proposed changes, on both procedural and substantive grounds,” Ms Kanake said.
The amendments pushed through in the ADC were fronted by Mr Misori, Mr Milemba, Mr Njenga, Assistant Secretary-General Moses Nthurima, Organising Secretary Paul Maingi, Woman Representative Catherine Wambilianga, Vice-Chairman Julius Korir and secretary for secondary schools Edward Obwocha.
Mr Tonui said yesterday that “top union officials should read the signs of time and that impunity cannot be tolerated by the most educated of professionals in the country”.
“I call upon the Secretary-General to undertake a genuine union constitutional amendment by writing to the members asking them to forward their proposed amendments and forward the same to the constitutional committee, National Governing Council and the Branch General Assemblies without filtering, for debate and adoption” Mr Tonui stated.
Among the changes proposed are scrapping the retirement age, which is seen as aimed at benefiting the national officials including Mr Misori, Mr Njenga, Mr Milemba, Mr Nthurima and Maingi who are expected to have far overshot the 60-year age limit by the 2026 elections.
The changes also require branch officials to relinquish their positions should they aspire to run for national office.
There’s also an increase in registration fees for various positions at the branch and national office, expansion of the National Executive Board, creation of Regional Councils and inclusion of junior school representatives in the hierarchy of the union.
