Government frustrating teachers through courts – Musalia Mudavadi

Amani National Coalition (ANC) leader Musalia Mudavadi has accused the Jubilee administration of frustrating teachers by ‘influencing’ the Court of Appeal to deny them the 50 – 60% pay rise awarded to them by the Employment and Labour Relations Court on June 30^th this year.

Mudavadi accuses the government of absconding its oath of office by ‘hiding behind courts to frustrate teachers’ legitimate demands to be treated fairly’.

“Government should stop humiliating teachers. Teachers while humiliated and feel discriminated are not good for the education system,” said Mudavadi.

“Kenya has had a very credible system of education both internally and externally. The way government is systematically dismantling basic foundations of the education system puts the country in jeopardy.”

Further, he argues that the intransigence with which government has handled teachers symbolises an incredibly clumsy government that is about to fall apart.

“Government ought to focus on the bigger picture least it destroys the basic foundation of the education system in Kenya and jeopardises the competitiveness of the Kenyan human resource,” added the ANC leader.

He argues that by choosing unyielding positions, the government is betraying its oath of office by destroying a generation of young Kenyans in the education institutions.

“The education sector is being broken. From ECD to university, systems have broken down. But instead of the government addressing the meltdown, it has chosen the easy road of window dressing.”

Mudavadi, a former Minister for Finance, said that impunity has driven the government to throw management of education into disrepute resulting to education policies being made at the whim of individuals.

He added: “Schools were arbitrarily closed without considering the constitutional right to education by our children; government refused to honour a 50-60% Court award sought by KNUT and is now hiding in courts; free primary education funds are irregularly remitted.”

“Until recently, schools’ boards were not functional; chaos stalk university education with unaccredited programmes’ and KNEC has closed its eyes to exam leakages.”

He said he will challenge Parliament again, having done it first last year, to amend the KNEC law to make it more accountable in its operations and decisions.

This, he says, followed the unexplained massive cancellation exam results in Vihiga County with Chavakali High School being the main victim.

“Given the massive leakage reported this year, I once again request  MPs to urgently amend the KNEC law to make that body accountable to Kenyans rather than to the CS for Education,” he said.

Mudavadi was speaking during a meet-the-people tour in Nairobi’s Embakasi estate on Sunday. His remarks followed the Friday ruling by the Court of Appeal that declared the 50 – 60% pay rise to the teachers by the Employment and Labour Relations Court unconstitutional.

Teachers, however, through the Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT), vowed to challenge the ruling at the Supreme Court.