Egerton University issues notice of redundancies to staff

More than 500 staff at Egerton University are on edge after the institution’s management issued a notice on declaration of redundancies next week.

In a circular, the university has scheduled a meeting on Tuesday where the Vice Chancellor will disclose details of the redundancies.

The notice comes as Vice Chancellors, Ministry of Education officials and funding boards converged in Mombasa for the first Biennial Universities Funding Conference and proposed a raft of recommendations to bail out public universities that are sinking under debts and other problems.

For the last 3 years, Egerton University has been on its knees financially with a debt of more than Ksh.8 billion shillings.

Out of the 30 public universities, Egerton is one of the worst hit, as it pays its lecturers 57 per cent of their salaries; a move that has pushed the staff into numerous strikes in an attempt to push for full payment of their pay.

This is just the tip of the iceberg as now the university, through a notice issued on the February 23, 2023, sent out to all staff of the university, notified the workers to attend a Vice Chancellor’s address on Tuesday February 28; the agenda being to declare staff redundancies.

The Universities Academic Union Staff Association (UASU) officials Egerton chapter has however has termed the notice a misguided move that will not solve the cash crunch the institution faces.

Chapter Secretary General Dr. Grace Kibue said: “We’ve seen this notice, this redundancy is ill-timed...others have taken early retirement, some left and therefore there is acute shortage of teaching staff, who are you retrenching? People have gone and the number has gone up….the redundancy is targeted.”

This development comes as Egerton University Vice Chancellor Prof. Issac Kibwage joined other VCs at the first Universities Funding Conference in Mombasa to find solutions of pulling the institutions of higher learning out of the financial morass that has pushed then into pending bills amounting to Ksh.60.8 billion as at February this year.

The conference came up with a raft of resolutions that could see the varsities restore the lost glory. This includes: writing off the Pending Pay As You Earn bill amounting to Ksh.18 billion owed to KRA, clearing the pending pension bill of Ksh.19.6 billion in targeted instalments among others.

The conference resolved that the Universities Act of 2012 be amended to have the role of appointing VCs handed over to the respective University Councils as opposed to the Public Service Commission.

The universities were also encouraged to lease campus spaces, grounds, and farms to raise rental income.

With the limited funds in public universities, students who meet the minimum university entry grade of C+ and above are not guaranteed to acquire government sponsorship due to the limited cash availed by the government.

Sources say more than 30,000 university hopefuls are likely to be locked out of the government sponsorship program, which means only 40,000 will be considered.

Geoffrey Monari, the Universities Fund CEO, said: “We are not going to tie placement to the amount of money, placement will continue...we can place the 173,000 but the funding part, we are going to fund based on available funds.”

The new proposals will see school fees increased from the current Ksh.16,000 to Ksh.48,000 but apply for first-year students from September this year.

“The next reviewed DUC on cost of programmes in the next financial year, we are in an awkward position by September when we present to the National Treasury, we have the revised figures as it is it is difficult,” added Mr, Monari.