Sacked county finance boss reinstated, to get Sh2m

The Employment and Labour Relations Court has reinstated Wilson Mungai as the Nakuru County Finance Director.

Mr Mungai's employment was terminated in September 2018 after the new administration took over.

In her ruling, Justice Hellen Wasilwa also ordered Governor Lee Kinyanjui's administration to pay Mr Mungai Sh2 million as damages.

The judge declared as illegal, the decision by the County Public Service Board to suspend Mungai’s salary after sending him on a four-month compulsory leave. 

The court also overturned the county’s action to transfer him from the finance department to the Information Communication Technology (ICT) Department.

“The move by the county to transfer the applicant from one department to another and stop his salary is declared illegal, unfair, null, and void,” ruled Justice Wasilwa.

“The applicant is the lawful holder of the office of the director of financial management,” she said.

On Tuesday, the judge ordered the county government to pay Mungai full salary from the day he was terminated to date and reinstate him immediately.

Mungai sued the county secretary, the County Public Service Board, and the county government in 2018 after his salary was stopped and he was sent on compulsory leave before being transferred to another department.

He said he was, on June 27, 2014, appointed the director of financial management in the department of County Treasury.

Mungai said he served until August 28, 2017, when he was sent on compulsory leave alongside other directors and ward administrators.

“The county stopped my salary while I was on leave and sent me a letter transferring me to the department of ICT on September 22, 2018,” he told the court.

He claimed that he couldn’t work in the new docket because the department has no office of a finance manager.

Mungai and the county failed to settle the matter outside court after mediation talks ordered by the court failed. This saw the matter go to a full hearing.