Special Needs Education (SNE) teachers in Laikipia have threatened to down their tools over alleged discrimination by the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) in implementing Career Progression Guidelines, as schools reopen for the third term this week.
The teachers, who spoke in Nanyuki, claimed that TSC had failed to implement recommendations by the National Assembly addressing grading discrepancies, payment of salary arrears accumulated over eight years and adherence to Career Progression Guidelines.
They said the failure had caused them financial hardship and denied them benefits associated with their rightful job grades.
“We are airing our grievances on Career Progression Guidelines, in which were discriminated against in 2018 when the scheme for payment of teachers migrated to the new system,” said Mwenda Mwithimbu, the SNE teachers’ coordinator in Laikipia County.
Mwithimbu claimed SNE teachers were supposed to be placed two grades higher than their counterparts in regular schools because of the specialised nature of their work.
“TSC should grade us accordingly and remunerate us, while backdating salary arrears to 2018. Parliament issued a six-month ultimatum to that effect, but nothing has been done yet,” he said.
Mwithimbu accused the commission of failing to implement a petition adopted by Parliament, describing the situation as discriminatory.
He called for the correction and conversion of all SNE teachers’ grades in accordance with the approved Career Progression Guidelines, proper grading, backdating and payment of all salary arrears, and recognition of C2 as the appropriate entry grade for qualified SNE teachers.
The teachers also criticised the Kenya Union of Special Needs Education Teachers (KUSNET) over alleged monthly deductions from their salaries by TSC on behalf of the union.
“At the top, we have a union purporting to represent us, but there is no physical office and we do not know who elected them. We are being deducted money by TSC in favour of KUSNET, yet we are not members,” Mwithimbu said.
Meanwhile, Renyenjes Member of Parliament Muchangi Karemba said in February that TSC had admitted before the Public Petitions Committee that job titles in the payroll and those contained in the 2018 Career Progression Guidelines had been aligned for SNE teachers.
He said the commission attributed delays in implementing the changes to government payroll systems undergoing reconfiguration during migration to a new system.
Karemba said the committee observed that although teachers’ basic salaries were not adversely affected, other benefits and allowances tied to specific grades had been affected, causing confusion and denying SNE teachers their rightful recognition in the public service.
The petition concerning alleged discrimination by TSC in the career progression of SNE teachers was tabled in Parliament in 2023 by Dr Robert Junua Wekesa, an academician.
By Muturi Mwangi
