Private sector wants national pay policy
What you need to know:
- Mr Obath said national dialogue on what the country can afford is necessary “so that we do not rely on inflation to make demands”.
- Mr Gitahi said the government should focus on productivity of its work force and reduce its recurrent expenditure to spare more funds for development.
The private sector wants the government to develop a policy to guide remuneration in public and private organisations.
Federation of Kenya Employers (FKE) and the Kenya Private Sector Alliance (Kepsa) said the policy would help to address industrial relations.
They spoke in Nairobi yesterday during a breakfast meeting on the teachers’ strike with Education Cabinet Secretary Jacob Kaimenyi.
Kepsa’s Patrick Obath called for a paradigm shift in the way salaries are negotiated and determined.
“We need to have a structure in place. It is not about demands but what Kenya can afford,” he said.
Mr Obath said national dialogue on what the country can afford is necessary “so that we do not rely on inflation to make demands”.
FKE Chairman Linus Gitahi asked the government to look for ways of reducing the huge national wage bill.
He said 52 per cent of the country’s domestic revenue was going to salaries, which was unsustainable.
Mr Gitahi said the government should focus on productivity of its work force and reduce its recurrent expenditure to spare more funds for development.
READY TO HELP
He said the private sector was ready to help the government find a long lasting solution to industrial disputes in the public sector.
FKE Chief Executive Jacqueline Mugo said the government should reconsider the law on picketing, saying it was passed in a hurry.
“We copied word for word these laws from South Africa and that is why we have problems similar to South Africa because workers are always in a hurry to issue strike notice without exhausting negotiations,” she said.
