The imminent departure of several vice chancellors at the expiry of their terms has brought to the fore a disturbing aspect of public university management in Kenya. Today, there are at least 10 non-substantive vice chancellors in our public universities. The limitations that come with acting capacities in such institutions impact negatively on their growth, not least because acting Vice Chancellors cannot exercise full power. Vice chancellors are not only the chief administrative officers of their institutions, they chair the university councils and the finance committees and must therefore be able to exercise full powers to get things moving.
Political meddling in the affairs of institutions of higher learning has also had its negative effects on our public universities.
Last year, acting Moi University Vice Chancellor Laban Ayiro had his appointment resisted by local leaders whose overriding concern was that someone from the local community takes over the management of the institution.
Such short-sightedness has seen Kenyan universities perform poorly and rank much lower internationally than they ideally should. This undermines our prowess as a knowledge driven economy. Kenyan universities are already weighed down by other challenges, including inadequate funding for research and day-to-day running following the Government's scaling down of funding in the 1990s.
The 2016-2017 Supplementary Funding estimates for universities had a Sh5 billion cut despite the previous year’s shortfall of Sh9 billion. Research suffers most, yet it is through research that innovation and other drivers of development are advanced. Determination to improve the quality of education offered by our universities must be matched with adequate financing.
A recent World Bank report indicates that 40 per cent of Kenyan intellectuals seek jobs abroad to beat poor remuneration and working conditions locally. This brain drain saw the lecturer-student ratio of 25:1 in 1986 drop to 52:1 in 2013. Library facilities and other infrastructure are overstretched given the large number of freshermen.
In recent years, public universities have experienced too much industrial action by lecturers over poor remuneration and working conditions. As such, while it is important to have substantive Vice Chancellors, other factors that undercut the development of our higher learning need to be looked into urgently.
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