Bloated wage bill: Finally, Kenya’s moment of truth

By XN Iraki

Kenya: In the run up to the referendum for the Constitution in 2010, several people voiced their concern over the cost of the new political dispensation. They were quickly ignored.

A careful analysis of the framers of the Constitution shows they were mostly lawyers with one major objective: to ensure there shall never be another all-powerful President. But they seemed not sure of the replacement. They distributed power so much that no one seems to have any power except the courts.

This constitution-making process was well exploited by elites who ensured they got the best of the world. They created plum jobs for themselves, protected by the Constitution. The hoi polloi simply voted; few, if any, read what they voted for.

Copying the Americans

Add devolution, where 47 districts that were previously ran by civil servants called DCs are now ran by elected governors with governments determined to mimic the imperial president we rallied against, including restricting photography near their mansions. Now you see the genesis of the bloated wage bill.

But it goes further.

The National Accord signed after the 2008 post-election violence lead to a bloated government with over 40 ministries to ensure both sides of the political divide were represented.

The Constitution reduces the number of ministers, oddly called Cabinet Secretaries, to 18. We could not even get a modern name for our ministers because we had to copy the American system, which is more than two centuries old. But the number of employees below the minister remained the same with less work. Can ODM talk?

Add the perennial strikes in which salaries are raised with no commensurate rise in productivity, and a bloated wage bill becomes a reality.

Some may recall that the dream team assembled by former President Moi to turn the economy around was well paid. That set precedence where top civil servants are well paid. The thinking is to attract performers from the private sector.

Management theorists could argue that having few well-paid people leads to motivation; everyone works hard and aspires to reach that level. But it could also lead to resentment and anger.

Observers might also note that for the last 50 years, Kenya had no oil, the major source of money has been the “Government”, and elites devised ways to get that money legally through allowances.

Some could argue that extreme individualism has led us to the current rut. Why bother about the rest of the country, someone else will, particularly in Government. Has patriotism waned, hence the popularity of dual citizenship?

The bloated workforce is also a result of politics. Several jobs are “created” every election cycle to buy loyalty. The governors’ eagerness to hire more people when we know the old county councils were bloated is an investment in votes.

Unlike in the private sector where most jobs must be justified, you can give an order in the public sector, “Let there be a job”, and then worry later about what the job holder will do.

In a country where unemployment is high, this approach, which makes political but no economic sense, would be preferred.

Our choices

Where do we go from here, what are our choices?

President Moi, under pressure from Bretton Woods institutions, retrenched Government employees to reduce the wage bill. The “golden handshake” had workers paid some money if they had worked for a certain number of years. The problem with this approach was that it is the good workers who left first. The dead woods had nowhere to go.  Retrenchment is politically expensive.

We could trim allowances that really bloat the wage bill. 

For example, some people are paid “sitting allowances” but nobody pays me “standing allowance” since I spend lots of time standing. Why are people paid extra money to do what they are supposed to? This has led to the postponement of decisions and unnecessary travel to earn more allowances.

Reviewing the incentive system in the Government at all levels could reduce the wage bill.

And isn’t it time Government officers drove more fuel-efficient vehicles like the Toyota Vitz?

Blanket salary cuts may not be the best approach; they will lower workers’ morale and reduce their productivity. That will be costly to the economy. What happened to the famous performance contracting?

A much better approach to manage the wage bill is to create more work for the current employees to justify their salaries. Can they work over weekends? Can we actualise the 24-hour economy so that we can employ more workers?

This approach is a win-win for both workers and politicians who fear losing votes because of job losses.

A more radical approach would be to change the Constitution to have Government systems that reflect economic reality.

Do you know that the words wealth and poverty do not appear in our Constitution? We copied the American system (that had been copied by Nigeria unsuccessfully) without looking at the fundamentals — our economic situation, our view of the world and each other.

The next Constitution review team must be diverse and include economists and, very importantly, anthropologists and psychologists — experts who understand how the average Kenyan thinks. 

The writer is a lecturer and MBA programme co-ordinator, University of Nairobi.

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