Talks to avert a nationwide strike by university lecturers and non-teaching staff have collapsed, setting the stage for the industrial action beginning midnight which might ground operations, adding to the litany of woes facing the sub-sector.
The strike has been called jointly by the University Academic Staff Union (Uasu) and the Kenya Universities Staff Union (Kusu). The strike comes barely a week after university students called off their own strike after intervention by the government. The students are unhappy with the higher education funding model.
Uasu and Kusu issued the notice last week on Wednesday September 11 2024. Two days later, the cabinet secretary for Education Julius Ogamba wrote to invite the unions for a meeting on Monday September 16 2024. However the meeting ended in a stalemate.
“Whatever the CS and his team was requesting us to do, we couldn’t give right away. After consultation with our members and the relevant organs of our unions, they said, no more waiting for negotiations. It’s not feasible to continue earning the same in the current economic environment where everything has gone up and our purchasing power eroded,” Dr Charles Mukhwaya, the secretary-general of Kusu told Nation.
His Uasu counterpart Dr Constantine Wasonga told Nation that lecturers are prepared for a long-drawn-out strike to get better pay for them.
“We don’t eat promises or promisory notes. If it takes years, we don’t care, as long as our members concerns aren’t taken care of. If they come with promises, we’ll reject them. We want something tangible,” he said.
Dr Wasonga said that the cabinet secretary for Labour Alfred Mutua called him after the meeting with Mr Ogamba.
“I told him, we’ll meet after we launch the strike but we’ll give him audience,” Dr Wasonga said.
The union officials are now expected to hold launches of the strike at the various campuses while the national launch will be at the Technical University of Kenya at 10.00am by the national officials of both Uasu and Kusu. There are 35 public universities in Kenya and three university constituent colleges. The unions have also planned to hold a ‘mega-demo’ in Nairobi on Monday next week.
The meeting at Jogoo House was also attended by the principal secretary for higher education Beatrice Inyangala, the national officials of the two unions, the chair of the Vice Chancellors of Public Universities Committee, Prof Daniel Mugendi and the chair of the Inter-Public Universities Councils Consultative Forum, Prof Peter Barasa.
“The government side wanted us to call of the strike notice to allow them address our issues but we cannot do that because they’ve had all the time. We can only do so if they agree to sign a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) by midnight,” a source who attended the meeting but is not authorised to talk to press said.
At the centre of the dispute is the proposed 2021 – 2025 CBA. The lecturers have waited for three years to negotiate the CBA as there has been no progress since they tabled their demand proposal on September 4 2020.
“There was no counter-proposal until 2023 and even that was a nil-offer to our members. They’ve now said no more waiting. We told the CS that if they’re unwell to give our members a salary increment, then they should cushion these workers, as a bare minimum,” Dr Mukhwaya said.
During the meeting with Mr Ogamba, the union officials demanded that their members be considered for the 7 to 10 per cent increment on their basic salaries that other government workers were given last year, as bare minimum.
According to the officials, workers in the lower job grades would get the higher percentage while those in higher grades get the least. However, Mr Ogamba offered to consult the “other relevant government departments”. He suggested a 3.5 per cent increment across all the cadres.
“Our history is that there’s no CBA that has come to us without a strike. We’ll have to go on three strikes; to negotiate the CBA, to register it in court and another one to implement it. We’re ready for all the three strikes,” Onesmus Mutio, the national organising secretary of Uasu told Nation.
In the 2020 demand proposal, Uasu demanded an increase of the monthly basic salary to Sh99,650 for the lowest paid lecturer (graduate assistant or tutorial fellow) and Sh338,146 for the highest paid professor, among other issues. The new CBA was supposed to have started in 2021 had the parties reached an agreement.
The current basic salary for the lowest paid lecturer is Sh 57,729 while the highest paid professor earns Sh 209,694, exclusive of other allowances.
According to Uasu, at conclusion of the CBA in 2025, the lowest paid lecturer would be earning a basic salary of Sh145,702 while the highest paid professor would pocket Sh494,415.
Efforts by the Ministry of Labour to broker an agreement between the parties failed to reach an agreement. The ministry had appointed R.A.O. Litaba as a conciliator.
