University workers have made fresh salary demands ahead of next week’s second meeting with vice chancellors as finer details of the comprehensive Sh10 billion offer emerged.
The more than 9,000 academic staff now say they will not participate in salary talks if house allowance is not part of the offer package to be tabled.
University Academic Staff Union (Uasu) Secretary General Constantine Wasonga also said the tabled offer must be backdated to 2017.
Implementation notes issued by the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) indicate that basic salary will be implemented from July 2019 under the 2017-2021 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), a move rejected by Uasu.
Wasonga said Uasu will further insist on seeing the findings of the economic report on cost of living prepared by the Ministry of Labour.
“Why are they in a hurry to table the offer to workers when the court advised the Ministry of Labour’s Central Planning and Monitoring Unit (CMPU) to prepare and file an economic report with the court?” Wasonga posed.
Details of the revised offer now breaks down the annual salary award of between 5.75 per cent and 6.27 per cent.
Finer details indicate that professors and associate professors may be the greatest beneficiaries if the new 2017-2021 CBA is adopted.
Professors will take an annual increment of about Sh8,547 and Sh9,753 for higher and lower limits, respectively.
This means a professor who currently earns a minimum salary of Sh170,681 per month will have their pay rise to Sh180,434 in the first year of implementation and Sh190,187 in the second year.
The staff will further have their pay rise to Sh199,940 and Sh209,693 for the third and fourth years, respectively.
And associate professors will have their basic salaries revised by Sh11,766 for the lower band and Sh8,724 for upper limits.
This means associate professors who presently earn a minimum pay of Sh112,038 will take home Sh120,141 and Sh128,244 in first and second years of implantation of the CBA.
The salaries will further rise to Sh136,347 and Sh144,450 in the third and fourth years.
Senior lecturers who presently earn a minimum of Sh112,038 will have their salaries increased to Sh120,141, Sh128,244, Sh136,347 and Sh144,450 for the next four years, respectively.
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This translates to an annual increase of between Sh11,766 for lower bands and Sh8,103 for higher bands.
Lecturers will get a pay rise of between Sh2,795 and Sh4,919.
Assistant lecturers/tutorial fellows will have their pay go up by between Sh3,561 and Sh5,392. Graduate assistants’ pay will also be increased annually by between Sh2,687 and Sh3,893.
Sources familiar with the details explained that the implementation details capturing the first three years of the CBA are now clearer after a technical team was formed to reconcile the salary proposals made to university lecturers.
Uasu proposed Prof Alex Okoth, Jacob Omollo and Mohamed Mwachiti to engage the SRC.
The team was formed after the initial offer lumped together the first three years of the CBA without specific details for the said years.
“The team did a good job and the offer is now ready for unions to start discussions,” said Prof Isaac Mbeche.
Prof Mbeche is the chairperson of the joint negotiations committee of the Inter Public Universities Councils Consultative Forum (IPUCCF).
Yesterday, he said the offer is now ready and will be shared with the unions.
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