Teachers strike shuts down public schools
Many schools across the country were on Tuesday shut down by a teachers’ strike called to pressure the government to recruit an additional 28,000 teachers.
The strike does not affect private schools. In Nairobi, the Kenya National Union of Teachers said the strike would continue until their demands are met.
Members of Parliament blamed Finance minister Uhuru Kenyatta for the strike, with the House Committee on Education accusing the minister of failing to provide the money to employ teachers.
Would not turn up
At the same time, the Knut national executive committee asked parents not to send children to school as teachers would not turn up.
“We are withdrawing labour from schools countrywide,” secretary-general David Okuta said after a meeting at the union’s offices in Nairobi.
At Parliament Buildings, Education committee members claimed credit for proposing cuts in the Budget to raise Sh6.7 billion, part of which was to finance the recruitment.
But the team blamed Mr Kenyatta for rejecting the proposal and instead allocating the money to the military.
Committee chairman David Koech said the lawmakers had done their bit in pushing the government to address the teachers’ shortage in the country.
The team was let down by the minister when he rejected the proposal as adopted by the House, Mr Koech said.
“In the corrigenda (to the Budget estimates) that he tabled in the House, the Minister of Finance had the power to include Sh5 billion for the employment of teachers. He failed to do so,” he said, adding: “The onus was and still is with the Minister of Finance.”
But the MPs did not mention that they cut a deal with the Executive in the presence of House Speaker Kenneth Marende to look the other way and postpone the recruitment of teachers until the next Budget.
Cover back and future taxes
The lawmakers did this after the Treasury agreed to allocate Sh2 billion from the Contingency Fund to cover their back and future taxes.
On Tuesday, they ducked questions about what the priorities should be since they were so focused on getting their tax arrears paid, and did not raise a finger when Mr Kenyatta decided to allocate the money saved in the Budget to the military.
The lawmakers said the minister ought to include the money for new teachers in the Supplementary Budget that is traditionally tabled in Parliament in March of every year.
The MPs claimed they could “not catch the Speaker’s eye” to contribute to the debate as the House approved the Budget in the Committee of Supply and that’s why they did not speak out against the decision to postpone the hiring of teachers.
Only Mr John Mbadi (Gwassi) spoke against the decision not to employ teachers in this financial year.
Mr Koech said that when it came to the “guillotine process” where budgets are passed without much debate, it was difficult to enforce the proposal to allocate Sh5 billion for the employment of teachers.
“There’s nothing much you can do. You either adopt the whole Budget or reject the whole of it.”
The MPs said the government ought to focus on the output from the pupils and students in schools and not spend every year allocating money to the Ministry of Education, yet the learners were starved of teachers, the effect of which lowers the quality of education.
Flanked by Mr John Pesa (Migori), Dr Wilbur Otichilo (Emuhaya) and Mr Francis Nyammo (Tetu), the MPs said there was no way the government could raise money now to employ the teachers, and the striking teachers should wait for the supplementary estimates.
At Knut headquarters, Mr Okuta, flanked by chairman Wilson Sossion and top union officials, said the strike had succeeded in paralysing learning.
“We are aware the government requested for a week to sort out the issue,” Mr Okuta said. “Let them work faster if they want us to end the strike.”
The officials agreed on a plan of carrying out the strike which shall include holding prayer sessions and reporting to branch offices countrywide.
Fridays will be dedicated to prayers for the leadership of the country, Mr Okuta said. Teachers will gather at their branch offices every Monday to receive instructions from the headquarters in Nairobi.
“We are calling on all our members to have a peaceful strike,” he said, noting that they did not expect any confrontation with the police.
On Monday, talks aimed at forestalling the strike chaired by Prime Minister Raila Odinga collapsed after Knut disagreed with the government side.
Mr Odinga, Education permanent secretary James ole Kiyiapi as well as Finance permanent secretary Joseph Kinyua had called for a week to iron out the matter.
Ignored Raila’s plea
They asked the unions to call off the strike, and wait for the government to report on the matter then. But Knut, alongside the Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers, defied the appeal.
The union wants the current 18,060 teachers employed on contract taken on a permanent basis, and a further 10,000 new ones employed to meet the existing staff shortage.
But while the government concedes there is a shortage of about 75,000 teachers in public schools, it argues there is no money to employ them.
About Sh6 billion is required to recruit the proposed number of teachers. But the employment of the 28,060 teachers is not all that Knut is asking for.
“We also want the government to employ the 20,000 early childhood education teachers it promised earlier in the year,” Mr Okuta said on Tuesday.
In January, Education minister Sam Ongeri said the Treasury had made a commitment to allocate funds for the recruitment of nursery school teachers.
