Two teachers’ unions are embroiled in a silent battle to entice junior school teachers to join them in a bid to increase their membership.
The 39,550 teachers deployed to JSS would boost the membership of any union and also contribute significant amounts of money in monthly union dues to the organisations.
Interim officials of the JSS teachers’ lobby told the Nation that they have been approached by both the Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) and the Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) with offers to join their ranks once their clamour for permanent and pensionable employment is approved by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC).
Knut mainly draws its membership from primary schools while Kuppet members come from post-secondary institutions.
In total, there are 219,727 teachers in primary schools and 125,563 in secondary schools. Membership to a union is voluntary and not all teachers have subscribed as members.
Apart from dues that members pay, non-member teachers who benefit from deals negotiated by the unions pay them agency fees monthly. Officials of the JSS lobby said the teachers will not join either of the unions but will instead form their own union. The lobby has been mobilising the teachers to strike for better terms.
On Wednesday, hundreds of the teachers held a demonstration outside the TSC headquarters in Upper Hill, Nairobi.
“We’ve received zero support from Knut. Instead, they’ve been asking us to go back to class as they negotiate on our behalf and requesting us to join the union. Kuppet has been encouraging us to fight for our rights so that, when we win, we can join them,” Mr Omari Omari, the spokesperson of the lobby, told the Nation.
“Kuppet has been willing to support us and offered to train us on negotiation skills before a meeting with the Labour Committee of the National Assembly. We appreciate their offer but our members are demanding to have their own union because they feel that they don’t belong to Knut or Kuppet,” Mr Omari said.
Kuppet has written to the TSC, the National Treasury, as well as the Budget and Education committees seeking their intervention on behalf of the teachers.
The coordinator of the lobby for Westlands Sub-county, Mr John Melvin, said the teachers will not return to class without a return-to-work formula.
“What’s being said about our employment in July is political propaganda. Knut doesn’t want us to demonstrate but Kuppet has offered us support, especially in counties outside Nairobi. We’re on our own but there’s no way we’re joining Knut,” he said.
Knut Secretary-General Collins Oyuu told the Nation he had met with the officials and asked them to call off the strike.
“I’ve sat with them on several occasions. We [Knut] took over the matter and instructed them to go back to class. Your matter has been sorted and in July, you’ll be absorbed without interviews. Right now, they’re operating outside the law and I know who’s inciting them,” Mr Oyuu said, although he declined to name the alleged inciter.
He added that the union is in talks with the TSC to withdraw the ‘show cause’ letters issued to teachers who have boycotted classes. Mr Oyuu last week asked the teachers to call off the strike following an announcement by the chair of the National Assembly Committee on Education, Tinderet MP Julius Melly, that Sh4.3 billion had been allocated to the TSC to employ on permanent terms 26,000 teachers who are currently on contract. That leaves out 20,000 others.
On Wednesday, May 29, however, Budget and Appropriations Committee chair Ndindi Nyoro told Parliament that the committee has proposed Sh10 billion to confirm all the 46,000 teachers to permanent and pensionable employment.
