Varsities write to SRC over jobs

The management of public universities now wants the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) to give direction on the fate of new job evaluation results after court dismissed unions’ plea.

In a letter to SRC chairperson Lyn Mengich, vice chancellors say that the matter has been pending for a long time.

“We would like to know the way forward in the matter since it has been outstanding for some time,” reads a letter by the vice chancellors committee.

The letter, dated May 14 and signed by committee chairperson Prof Francis Aduol, also makes reference to letters written to SRC between November 2017 and August 2018.

The latest correspondence means that universities management want to be directed on remuneration bands as salary agreements talks with unions loom. The development comes after Employment and Labour Relations Court dismissed claims by Universities Academic Staff Union (Uasu) that they were not consulted.

Placed them below

Justice Maureen Onyango said that unions had participated in the process based on correspondences to SRC. The union moved to court seeking to quash the grading structure, which they claimed placed them below junior administrative staff.

"The SRC job evaluation has downgraded a full professor to E2. If our nation's highest level of human resource, from whom knowledge flows to the rest of the citizens, would be thus lowly regarded, it would be a sad commentary indeed of where our beloved country places the pinnacle of knowledge," said Uasu secretary general Constantine Wasonga.

The SRC structure placed deputy vice-chancellors in job group E4. The union said that the SRC grading put VCs of old public institutions at higher groups (E5) compared to those in new or smaller universities.