Teachers win big as contract pushes salaries to Ksh200bn
What you need to know:
The Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) also states that teachers who perform well in schools will earn automatic promotions after annual performance evaluation
Nairobi. Senior teachers have emerged the biggest winners of the salary deal reached this week between their unions and the employer.
The workers through the Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) and the Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) signed new collective bargaining agreements that will cost taxpayers an additional Sh54 billion for next four years starting July next year.
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) currently spends Sh168 billion out of its Sh192 billion budget to pay salaries to more than 290,000 teachers across the country. This will now increase to about Sh200 billion.
On Wednesday Kuppet signed its agreement with TSC, a day after Knut concluded its own. The two are now expected to deposit the agreements in court next week to formalise them. Kuppet Chairman Omboko Milemba said the deal was timely and had been concluded quickly.
“We have been fighting for the increment to be pegged on the basic salary which is what has happened and that means that retiring teachers will now get a better package,” he said.
TSC Chief executive Nancy Macharia said the CBA had established a new grading and salary structure based on the principle of “equal pay for equal work.”
She said teaching had been enriched and enlarged in order to attract and retain the best professionals in public schools.
The Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) also states that teachers who perform well in schools will earn automatic promotions after annual performance evaluation and contracting.
The new deal make the recruitment of head teachers more competitive since senior teachers at grade C2 will now be eligible to apply and compete with deputies at grade C3.
In the re-organisation, those in Job group J to N earning from Sh24,662 to Sh48,190 will now be under C1- C5 grade earning between Sh27, 195 to Sh77, 840. Those in Job group P to T earning between Sh77,527 to 109,089 will now be under D1-D5 with a minimum salary of 93,408 and a maximum of 157,656 . And more than 50,000 teachers who are not affiliated to any union but who will benefit from the deal will be required to pay agency fees at two per cent of the basic salary to either Knut or Kuppet.
