House team probes Teachers Service Commission, retired tutors’ Sh42.3bn pension dispute

By Rawlings Otieno and Felix Olick

Nairobi, Kenya: A dispute in which 52,000 retired teachers are seeking to have their Sh42.3 billion pensions award honoured has found its way to Parliament.

Thursday, the retired teachers and the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) clashed on the actual figures before the Parliamentary Committee on Education as MPs called for goodwill to unlock the deadlock.

Committee Chairperson Sabina Chege said the payments were long overdue and challenged the Government to honour the Court ruling.

“These teachers are old and we are asking the Government to do justice for them. TSC and the Attorney General’s office should not inflate the figures to discourage the Government from paying,” Sabina told The Standard after their closed-door meeting.

She said the retired teachers are senior members of the society, whose contribution to the nation should be respected, adding that when the issue was first raised before the committee more than 500 retired teachers had died due to natural attrition.

She said AG Githu Muigai will convene a meeting between the retirees, the National Treasury and TSC on June 17.

She disclosed that the retirees indicated that they only want the Sh42.1 billion they had requested, but not figure Treasury is presenting which includes allowances and other benefits.

 “What the retired teachers are asking for is only the salary awarded in the 1997 deal and not other allowances like the house and commuter allowance. They no longer go to work so they cannot ask for commuter allowances,” she said.

Bomet Central MP Ronald Tonui warned the Government to stop playing tricks with the teachers’ welfare. He said he will move a motion to compel the State to increase the budgetary allocation to recruit more teachers and pay the retired ones.