Protests over budget deficits in some crucial sectors in 2012/2013 financial year could hamper performance and/or trigger a wave of industrial action.
Some of the sectors where there has been an outcry over underfunding include the Education and the Kenya Governance Justice Law Order Sector (GJLOS). Stakeholders complain that for many years this has been the norm.
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Finance Minister Robison Njeru Githae reads |
the budget in Parliament.
The Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) national chairman Wilson Sossion told The Standard On Sunday that the union leadership will issue a strike notice next month unless the Government provides additional budgetary allocations to meet its demands.
“The Ministry of Education should have been allocated Sh500 billion in the Sh1.4 trillion- budget read in Parliament to meet its obligations. Due to underfunding most of the teachers’ demands won’t be met,” said Sossion.
Teachers’ demands
Demands by Knut include five different allowances for teachers as per legal notice number 534 of 1997, responsibility allowances for head teachers, their deputies, heads of departments, and recruitment of about 40,000 teachers for Early Childhood Development Centres and public schools.
“As per the budget, the Government is only employing 10,000 teachers while there are no funds set aside for the 1997 allowances and responsibility allowances for head teachers,” said Sossion.
Sossion further noted, “The three demands are not negotiable. The Government either meets its obligation or it be prepared for the mother of all strikes in July.”
Knut has also been backed up by its rival, the Kenya Union of Post-Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet), which has promised to send children home if the Government does not release free primary education funds and subsidise secondary school education as earlier agreed. The two unions on Wednesday warned that the grace period given to the Government to release the funds is running out.
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