Demo
Kitui Junior Secondary School (JSS) intern teachers with the support of the Kitui branch KUPPET officials on Tuesday held peaceful demonstrations in Kitui Town over poor terms of service by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC).
The tutors who have been holding a ‘sit down’ strike for the second week running since the schools reopened complained of low salaries and failure by TSC to absorb them on Permanent and Pensionable terms vowing not to resume work until their grievances are heard and attended to.
The JSS interns want their demands to be fulfilled as per the Employment and Labour Relations Court ruling of 17 April 2024. The ruling ordered Teachers service commission (TSC) to them under permanent and pensionable employment terms.
The Kitui KUPPET branch Executive Secretary Mr Kioko Mutia while speaking during the protest, called upon TSC to implement the court ruling in order to end the stalemate.”We support the intern teachers’ demands for increased salaries and the TSC to compensate them on the years they have been underpaid and a return-to-work formula void of discrimination,” said the Executive Secretary Kioko.
The interns claimed to be overworked as they take 14 lessons per teacher per day contravening teaching ethics on workload. “TSC is at liberty to call the teachers for negotiations on how the interns can be confirmed into permanent and pensionable terms in compliance with the court ruling,” Mutia asserted.
“The JSS intern teachers should not be humiliated. We demand the TSC to cooperate in implementing their demands to the later,” Mutia added. One of the JSS intern teachers Mr Kalua Musee, while speaking during the protest lamented TSC’s discrimination while issuing employment letters.
He regretted that he is a graduate from Presbyterian University where he attained a First Class Honours in Education Science, but the government was yet to serve him with his letter, unlike some of his colleagues who have already received the letters. Justice Bryrum Ongaya of the Employment and Labour Relations Court on Wednesday, April 17 this year, ruled that TSC violated the intern teachers’ right to fair labour practice as they are qualified and possess teaching certificates.
“The respondents have not exhibited statutory regulatory or policy arrangements that would entitle the first respondent (TSC) to employ interns,” Ongaya said in the ruling. “Ideally, the first respondent should employ registered teachers on terms that are not discriminatory and to meet the optimal staffing needs in public schools,” the ruling said.
The intern teachers have been holding protests across the country since last year seeking better terms of employment.