KNUT issues seven day strike notice

KNUT issues seven day strike notice Written By:KBC Reporters,    Posted: Sun, Aug 19, 2012

KNUT Secretary General David Osiany says the matter of allowances remains unresolved The Kenya National Union of Teachers has issued a new strike notice threatening to disrupt learning in all public schools if the government fails to resolve the ongoing salary impasse within the next 7 days.  According to the union's chair Wilson Sossion, its members will have no option but to down their tools if the government fails to resolve all outstanding issues as contained in the legal notice 534 of 1997. KNUT Secretary General David Osiany says though the government fulfilled the salary bit of the bargain, the matter of allowances remains unresolved. KNUT had proposed a salary structure that would have seen teachers' pay reviewed upwards by 300 percent, a responsibility allowance pegged at 50 percent for principals and head teachers, 40 percent for deputies and senior teachers and 30 percent for Heads of Departments. The umbrella teachers union says if the government fails to address the issues, then it will mobilize its members for a nation-wide industrial action starting Monday 3rd of September this year. The teachers say that their plight has been ignored claiming that the recent salary increment for the civil servants announced by the Ministry of Public Service was not extended to the teaching fraternity. The Union officials  urged the government to stop focusing on minor issues and ignoring major issues that will affect education in the country. KUPPET Elsewhere, seven branches of Kenya Union of Post Primary Teachers (KUPPET) have threatened to mobilize their members to go on strike on September 5 if the Government does not address the disparities between teachers' salaries and the mainstream civil servants. In a statement read on behalf of Nakuru, Nyandarua, Laikipia, Nyeri, Kirinyaga and Embu branches by Njogu Mbui, the union said it had lost patience with the Teachers Service Commission and the Ministry of Education for failing to act on their demands to equalize the salaries and allowances of teachers with those of civil servants. The teachers termed the differences in commuter and house allowances and basic salaries as unfair since the teachers and the civil servants worked in the same economic environment. They said that while a teacher in Job Group M entered the grade at a salary of shs 35,275, their civil service counterparts entered the same grade at shs 41,590. The unionists said there is a difference of shs 30,800 in the salaries and allowances of teachers and civil servants of similar qualifications in Job Group M. They added that the teacher shortage is another problem they want addressed urgently.