The lecturers’ strike in Kenya’s public universities has entered its second week of agitating for better pay in an uphill battle that had been halted on September 26th, 2024.
This followed an agreement with the government that promised to fast-track the implementation of a Return-To-Work Formula (RTWF).
When the Government failed to implement the formula, the lecturers resumed their strike on October 29, 2024.
According to the 2012-2025 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), the monthly pay of a graduate assistant, if implemented, would range between Kshs. 63,647 and Kshs. 97,988; that of the assistant lecturers would range between Kshs. 107,872 and Kshs. 166,072, while professors would receive between Kshs. 224,631 and Kshs. 345,816.
Role of Lecturers
Universally, the role of educators, including lecturers, cannot be overstated. Indeed, they play a pivotal role at the individual, national and global levels in preparing a skilled citizenry aimed at positively impacting the society.
With the interruption greatly disrupting the academic calendars of the public universities, the big question would be: What is the socio-economic cost of lecturer strikes on the preparation of a skilled citizenry?
Universities are considered centres of the knowledge triangle interplay, that is teaching, research and innovation.
A university that is progressive can be considered as one in which the capacities of the human understanding are stretched and reconfigured in response to new opportunities and challenges, consequently leading to recurring knowledge generation.
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The growth and development of societies and nations depend on this knowledge generation. That is why we should be concerned as a nation pushing towards achieving our economic development goals.
Kenya attained a Low Middle Income Country status on September 30, 2014, following the rebasing of its national accounts, including its gross domestic product and gross national income.
However, it continues to struggle with socio-economic inequalities, including lack of gainful employment for the youth.
Therefore, occurrences such as lecturers’ strikes, seem to take the nation back on advances made so far. What emerges is a vicious cycle.
Lecturers’ strikes cripple the higher education environment, resulting in stunted and diminishing engagement in knowledge generation: a much-needed resource in skilling the higher education students and nurturing innovation.
Effects of strikes
The socio-economic impact of these strikes is felt across the socio-economic continuum: individually and nationally, both in the short-term and may persist to the long-term.
Presently, students in the Kenyan public universities are not learning; those purported to be in the learning environment are only engaged in online continuous assessments.
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This brings to play concerns over access, equality, equity, and inclusivity- factors that the Government has invested a lot of resources to ameliorate.
In the Supplementary Appropriation Act 2024, the education budget has been enhanced, with university education receiving KShs. 4.468 billion. In the 2024/2025 financial year, the Treasury has allocated Kshs. 656.6 billion to the education sector, with Kshs. 35.9 billion for university and tertiary students, Kshs. 16.9 billion for university students’ scholarships, Kshs. 16.9 billion for capitation and Kshs. 1.1 billion for research and innovation.
However, critics argue the current budgetary allocations for education stand at 4% of Kenya’s GDP, short of the recommended 6%.
According to the Treasury, Kenya’s economic growth is expected to maintain an upward trajectory of 5.5% growth. The service and agricultural sectors are identified as critical sectors in supporting this projected growth.
In addition, the Government proposed an allocation of Kshs. 237 billion in the 2024/2025 financial year to support manufacturing for job creation.
All these national investments should spur economic growth, but this is not likely to occur without the appropriate human capital consisting of well-skilled and knowledgeable citizenry.
Fixing Kenya’s Higher Education
Herein comes the role of higher education. While the engagement between the lecturers and the Government around the full implementation of any CBA should continue to their logical conclusions, a more sustainable approach should be sought.
Institutional structures can benefit from more transparent and decisive accountability measures to prevent hemorrhaging of resources. This is a sensitive area that universities tend to avoid discussing, resulting in ballooning institutional debts and threats of insolvency.
Adoption of such approaches as the Good Financial Grant Practice (GFGP), can help strengthen institutional capacities for managing their grant resources.
Prudent use of resources frees up funds that can then be allocated to the various higher education schools and departments, especially for research and innovation.
Products of such endeavors are subsequently consumed by industry and the labor market. An effectively managed university-industry connection can create opportunities that will attract more funding for research and innovation in the higher education institutions.
To complement strong governance and management frameworks in Kenya’s public universities, the Government should also increase the capitation for research and innovation. This will free up Kenyan universities’ over-reliance on student school fees as their major source of revenue, as they turn to more focused engagement in research and innovation.
Income generated from the efforts will create robust institutions that have appropriate and well-remunerated human resources that can effectively engage in teaching, research and innovation that will produce skilled citizenry for the 21st Century world of work.
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