Lecturers threaten new strike over pay

Lecturers have threatened to down their tools again if the Government fails to give universities the Sh10 billion meant for their pay rise.

Universities Academic Staff Union (UASU) secretary general Constantine Wasonga yesterday said he did not understand why the money had not been released to public universities.

He asked Government to act on an audit by the Ministry of Education that revealed Sh10 billion workers’ savings were missing from public universities’ accounts. “We are not afraid of going back to strike, we are well-known for that. The Government should immediately release the money, failure to which we are going to issue a fresh strike notice,” Wasonga said.

Dr Wasonga asked the Education CS Amina Mohamed to hand the report to the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission, Director of Public Prosecutions, Auditor General, Retirement of Benefits Authority and the Directorate of Criminal Investigation for action.

Wasonga accused public universities of failing to meet their statutory obligations to the Kenya Revenue Authority, National Social Security Fund, National Hospital Insurance Fund and the Retirement Benefit Scheme as well as the cooperative societies.

“The audit vindicates UASU. All along, the union has been saying financial mismanagement is rampant in our public universities and this has effected the welfare of academic staff,” he said.

Wasonga claimed some of the retired academic staff members were unable to get their pension.

UASU also opposed plans by Government to compel them to contribute to the National Housing Development Fund.