Teachers to get their September pay Monday, CS Fred Matiangi announces

Teachers to get their September pay Monday, CS Fred Matiangi announces

Teachers can now breathe a sigh of relief after the government announced that it will pay their September salaries, which were held following a month-long strike, on Monday.

Education Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i said that teachers who missed their September pay will start receiving it on Monday, November 30th, 2015.

“Had discussions with Teachers Service Commission (TSC) Secretary, consulted with colleagues Attorney General (AG) & Cabinet Secretary (CS) Rotich. Teachers’ September salaries to be paid from tomorrow,” said Matiang’i in a tweet.

The Cabinet Secretary also said that he was looking forward to hold a consultative meeting with both the Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) and Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers KUPPET Monday morning, adding that he will spend a good part of the week meeting stake holders in the education sector.

More than 243,000 teachers missed their September salaries, after TSC withheld their pay for allegedly absconding duty during the month-long strike. Only 42,973 teachers received their pay.

Most of the teachers who were paid were Principals, their deputies and heads of departments, who were in schools during the strike that started on August 31st, 2015.

Previously, KNUT officials held a National Steering Committee meeting to chant the way forward on the State House deal that ended the stalemate between teachers and their employers and ordered that a new Collective Bargaining Agreement be reached within 30 days.

According to KNUT Chairman Mudzo Nzili, this was the first of three meetings to be held where a decision was to be made on whether to hold fresh pay talks with TSC as agreed in a meeting chaired by President Uhuru Kenyatta earlier this month.

On its part, the Industrial Court had declined to grant the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) orders stopping payment of teachers’ September salaries.

In a ruling, Justice Jorum Abuodha said the ruling on the issue should be made by the Court of Appeal, since he had already ordered TSC to pay teachers’ salaries in September.

President Kenyatta directed TSC to pay teachers their September salaries in addition to kick starting the all important negotiation within a month in order to come up with a collective bargaining agreement to be implemented within four years.

The rare but progressive meeting was convened by President Kenyatta at State House, Nairobi as KNUT and TSC officials sought to break the protracted legal and street battles between the government and teachers over pay.

President Kenyatta also ordered for negotiations between the warring parties whose results he said must be announced in a month after they withdraw all pending court cases.

In October KNUT reported that four of its members committed suicide following the withholding of September salaries by the TSC.

 

 

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tsc KNUT KUPPET CS Fred Matiang’i Teachers to get their September pay

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