Teachers threaten to go on strike in fresh pay row

Teachers have threatened to go on strike if the government fails to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA).

Kenya National Union of Teachers secretary-general Wilson Sossion has written to the Teachers Service Commission, accusing it of ignoring its calls to initiate negotiations for the next CBA.

The teachers’ union has issued a seven-day notice to the TSC demanding that it commences the negotiations, failure to which it shall mobilise its members to go on strike.

“I am under firm instruction from NEC to hereby demand that you put in place the necessary measures to commence negotiations within seven days. Be informed that upon the expiry of this period, Knut shall be left with no other option but to organise its membership for an industrial action to compel you to comply as provided for under section 41 of the Constitution,” reads the letter.

Suspended CBA

The union says it had given TSC three weeks to initiate the negotiations but the commission ignored the notice and went ahead to revoke the existing Knut/TSC recognition agreement.

Among the issues the union wants included in the 2021-2023 CBA are a recommendation of a two year CBA cycle and discussions on the issues raised in the Employment and Labour Relations court concerning the current agreement.

The union has accused the TSC of mismanaging the implementation of the current 2017-2021 CBA, which was suspended in July 2019.

Mr Sossion noted that union members were locked out of promotions after the the teachers’ employer “messed up with the Knut register”.

“TSC should not put us in the collision course with the government and disrupt the industrial peace in the teaching service by engaging in mischievous and illegal ways of conceiving, negotiating and implementing the CBA,” says the union in the letter to TSC.