University lecturers petition IMF over unpaid wages, SRC interference in Kenya
UASU petitioned the IMF Wage Bill Mission to Kenya over what it describes as persistent breaches of collective bargaining rights and long-standing pay injustices affecting university lecturers.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been urged to intervene in Kenya’s public university sector to address stalled salaries, unfulfilled collective bargaining agreements and alleged violations of academic staff rights by the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC).
In a memorandum, the Universities' Academic Staff Union (UASU) petitioned the IMF Wage Bill Mission to Kenya over what it describes as persistent breaches of collective bargaining rights and long-standing pay injustices affecting university lecturers.
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Signed by UASU Secretary General Constantine Wasonga, the petition accuses the SRC of consistently overstepping its constitutional advisory mandate by issuing directives that the union says effectively dictate outcomes in salary negotiations. According to UASU, this practice undermines free and fair collective bargaining as protected under Article 41 of the Constitution.
The union claims SRC advisories, commonly referred to as “beacons,” have become non-negotiable instructions, reducing the negotiation process between UASU and public university employers to what it calls “a public relations exercise.”
UASU also highlights chronic delays in salary and allowance payments, which it attributes to late and insufficient funding from the National Treasury. The union argues that these delays have eroded the welfare and morale of lecturers, forcing some to seek secondary employment and triggering repeated industrial unrest.
“This fiscal instability directly impedes the core functions of the academic environment, resulting in diminished efficiency in teaching, lower quality research output and inadequate mentorship, as faculty are forced to divert attention to coping mechanisms like strikes and seeking secondary employment. Institutionally, the practice of accumulating significant salary and CBA arrears artificially inflates annual expenditures when finally budgeted for, worsening the universities’ fiscal health and contributing to the wider challenge of unsustainability of the public sector wage bill,” reads the petition.
The petition comes shortly after the National Treasury confirmed that the IMF Fiscal Affairs Department will conduct a Wage Bill Mission in Kenya from November 17 to 25, 2025. In a letter addressed to trade unions, the Treasury stated that the mission will review the management of the public sector wage bill, analyse expenditure trends, and assess ongoing wage reforms across government ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs).
UASU has further raised concern over the lack of budgeting for staff promotions, saying many lecturers perform higher duties for years without corresponding pay due to the absence of pre-funded promotion provisions. The union warns this has led to substantial salary arrears and declining morale.
The memorandum also flags severe staff shortages in public universities. UASU notes that while Kenya requires over 35,000 academic staff to match growing student enrolment, there are only about 10,000 lecturers, creating a deficit exceeding 25,000.
On pay disparities, the union says academic staff receive an automatic annual increment of just four per cent, compared with up to twelve per cent for other public servants, which it describes as discriminatory and unconstitutional.
“The SRC has also failed to conclusively and convincingly address the dire need for harmonisation of allowances across the public sector, and between and within public universities. This is despite SRC’s promise to implement the Allowances Policy Guideline for the Public Service with effect from April 2022,” reads the petition.
UASU also criticised the government for permitting unequal allowances across the public sector, despite SRC’s earlier commitment to harmonise them by 2022. The union says these disparities continue to fuel agitation and instability within the university sector.
“Consequently, the salary scales for civil service, county governments, Teachers Service Commission and parastatals (universities) have compression ratios of between 4.2 and 22.8. The civil service scale has the highest mean compression ratio of 15.9, followed by county governments, parastatals and the Teachers Service Commission. The compression ratios in the public sector depict the existence of salary differentials within grades,” reads the petition.
“Specifically, workers in the civil service and county governments have wage premiums, which range from 13.3-293.7 per cent in favour of employees in bands B5-E4 relative to those in band B4, while public sector workers in bands C1-D5 in the Teachers Service Commission have an average wage premium of 36.5-186.8 per cent relative to those in band B4.”
The union is urging the IMF to recommend reforms, including restoring the two-year collective bargaining cycle, structured clearance of salary arrears, harmonisation of salaries and allowances, direct payment of university staff by the National Treasury and strict limitation of SRC’s role to advisory functions only.
“Addressing these systemic issues will restore industrial harmony, boost morale and productivity, and ultimately stabilise the public university system,” Wasonga said in the memorandum.
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