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KENYA: No Graduation, No Teaching as Public University Lecturers Boycott Teaching
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Submitted by IQ4News on Wed, 16/11/2011 - 9:11am
By Joab Apollo
Nothing exemplifies the frustration occasioned by the industrial boycott by lecturers in all the public universities in Kenya, than the sight of Joshua Tarbei.
The first year Information Science student at Moi University in Eldoret is worried that barely two months in the university, he has to grapple with the prospect of going back to the village where he stayed for one year as he waited to be admitted to an institution of higher learning.
“I just hate going back to the village because there is nothing I am going to do there. I just hate idling. The lecturers should consider us,” Trabei says.
To him, the strike is coming at the wrong time, and he is not the only one inconvenienced.
Graduation ceremonies, exams and many campus activities will now have to be shelved in the universities until a solution is found to the strike which began last week.
The lecturers blame the government for taking them for granted, dishonouring pledges to increase their pay and provide a conducive environment for study and research.
The University Academic Staff Union (UASU) maintains that the strike will continue until the government increases their wages.
UASU Secretary General Professor Muga K’orlale said that they want nothing short of salary increment and vowed that their members will not be cowed by threats by the government to relieve them of their duties.
"We are concerned there have been threats to treat lecturers and workers who stay away from university precincts as having proceeded on leave without pay, but we will treat these as rumours for now. We demand to given our rightful dues otherwise we have no business in this institution," K’orlale says.
The lecturers demand that their salaries be in commensurate to Members of Parliament and top government officials like Permanent Secretaries, arguing their hard work in Universities has lead to churning out of world class professionals and that it will motivate them to perform better.
Currently, they earn between Ksh. 90,000 to 120, 000. Members of Parliament on the hand take home a whopping Ksh. 800, 000, a fact that lead to Transparency International declaring Kenya in 2009 as the most unequal country in Africa.
The strike has seen the closure of three universities indefinitely.
Chepkoilel University College is the latest to close after, Egerton and Masinde Muliro Universites. On Tuesday, students at the University of Nairobi took to the streets demanding that the government resolves the stand off.
Two Universities, Egerton and Mombasa Polytechnic University College have postponed their graduation ceremonies that were slated for next week until further notice, causing anxiety to prospective graduands.
It is believed many graduation ceremonies slated for December may be called off unless the government moves expeditiously.
Higher Education Minister, Professor Margret Kamar, herself a former lecturer at Moi University, has maintained that the government has no money to pay the lecturers and declared the strike illegal and called on the dons to a negotiating table.
“We cannot afford to close the universities even for a week. We should not disadvantage students over issues that we can resolve. I want to appeal to the universities and the union, which the only way we can broker a deal, is to sit on the table,” Professor Kamar reckons.
Last week a meeting with UASU officials at the Office of the Prime Minister Raila Odinga yielded little results after top UASU officials dismissed the PM’s office for bypassing them and dealing with junior officials of the union.
Now, as the war of words and blame game ensues, what is seen at the moment are deserted lecture theaters, students loafing around campus and Union officials addressing Press Conferences.
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