County fires over 120 cleaners to tame wage bill

Over 120 cleaners in Nandi County have been rendered jobless after the county administrator Mr Joseph Melly declared their posts redundant.

The cleaners’ contracts were terminated on Wednesday 2nd December 2015 in an apparent move to cut on the soaring wage bill in the county.

The decision terminate the services of the cleaners followed a closed-door meeting held by the county officials at the end of November to work out ways of cutting the wage bill.

“We are wondering what we did wrong for them to re-advertise the jobs we have been doing to support our families,” said one of the cleaners.

Melly, notes that the County administration had issued a 21-day notice of termination, saying currently the County spends slightly over Ksh 100 million in salaries every month.

Concerns have been raised over the wage bill which is said to have burgeoned over time with the only solution being cutting down on number of causal workers.

The letter sent to all the 10 chief officers and copied to Governor Dr Cleophas Lagat, County secretaries, all County executives and the County public service board advised chief officers to inform all cleaners not report to work beginning December.

The cleaners have accused the county administrator Josephat Melly and the County Secretary Francis Ominde for orchestrating their dismissal.

Each of the affected cleaners would be paid Ksh 21,000 as send-off package that would cost the County up to Ksh 2.5 million.

Documents show that cleaners attached to their departments had already been informed of the imminent dismissal.

One of the documents, a letter addressed to an affected cleaner and signed by Francis on behalf of the county administrator communicated the retrenchment message to the workers.