Parliament has stepped into the lecturers’ strike stalemate, with two house teams set to Parliament broker efforts to end the three-week disruption of learning in public universities.
The intervention came after three university staff unions petitioned the National Assembly over what they termed unresolved funding and implementation issues surrounding the 2025/2029 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA).
Speaker Moses Wetang’ula yesterday committed the petition by the Universities Academic Staff Union (UASU), Kenya Universities Staff Union (KUSU) and KUDHEIHA to the joint committees on Education and Labour.
The petition, signed by UASU Secretary-General Dr Constantine Wasonga, KUSU Secretary-General Dr Charles Mukhwana and KUDHEIHA National Trustee Odoyo Genga, accuses the Ministry of Education and the Inter-Public Universities Councils Consultative Forum (IPUCCF) of failing to honour commitments made under return-to-work agreements.
“The parties aver that parties to disputes signed a return-to-work formula in November 2024, committing themselves to concluding negotiations and implementing the 2025/2029 CBA,” Wetang’ula said while reading the petition.
He added: “I direct that the petition be handled by joint committees of Education and Labour.”
The unions told Parliament that despite repeated commitments to conclude negotiations within 30 days, key financial questions remain unresolved.
They said the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) had informed their representatives that neither the Ministry nor the National Treasury had provided a written commitment guaranteeing that financial obligations arising from the CBAs would be funded through the Exchequer.
“This disclosure raises serious concerns regarding the credibility and viability of the negotiations,” the unions said.
They warned that relying on student fees and market-based funding to meet staff remuneration obligations could create discrimination among university employees.
Majority Leader Kimani Ichung’wah backed Parliament’s intervention but urged the unions to soften their stance and return to negotiations.
Ichung’wah said MPs were familiar with the history of the dispute and that the SRC could not simply be excluded from discussions involving public funds.
“I call for sobriety and dialogue between the unions and the Ministry of Higher Education. I am confident that we can find a solution to this matter,” he said.
He warned that students were ultimately paying the price for the prolonged dispute.
Funyula MP Wilberforce Oundo pushed for an even stronger parliamentary intervention, urging Wetang’ula to establish an ad hoc committee to deal with the matter.
Oundo said strikes had increasingly become an annual feature of the university calendar, disrupting students’ academic programmes.
“We have to deal with this matter because it has become an annual ritual,” he said.
The MP had earlier confronted Higher Education Principal Secretary Beatrice Inyangala over the Government’s efforts to end the strike during a session examining audit reports of public universities.
He questioned why students in private universities were completing their studies earlier than those in public institutions because of recurring disruptions.
Inyangala said the Government remained committed to dialogue with the unions but acknowledged a huge gap between the two sides.
She disclosed that the Government had offered Sh9.7 billion against union demands of Sh98 billion.
“We are negotiating and we are confident that we shall close this gap in the future,” she said during a session with the National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
The PS said the Government was also consulting the Public Service Commission on some human resource-related issues.
Already a number of students’ unions from various universities have threatened to join their lecturers’ strike if the government does not release all pending dues owed to the dons.
Technical University of Mombasa students' association president Joseph Oloo said the strike, which has already paralysed learning, has left both students and their parents frustrated.
“If the government does not pay lecturers, students will join the strike. We cannot continue like this,” he warned.
INSTANT ANALYSIS
With students now joining the pressure for an end to the strike, Parliament’s latest intervention could provide a fresh avenue for breaking the stalemate that has repeatedly paralysed public universities.
