Sunday, June 2, 2013

Knut issues strike threat over allowances

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KNUT national chairman Wilson Sossion. Photo/FILE
KNUT national chairman Wilson Sossion. Photo/FILE  NATION MEDIA GROUP
By NATION CORRESPONDENT
Posted  Sunday, June 2  2013 at  16:18
A teachers’ union has threatened to call a national strike next month if the government does not allocate funds to pay its members’ allowances in the next budget.
The government should factor Sh41 billion in the next budget to cater for the perks, said Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) national chairman Wilson Sossion at the weekend.
He at the same time called for the degazettement of legal notice No 16 of 2003 to facilitate the implementation and release of the allowances under legal notice 534 of 1997.
“It beats logic for the government to talk of being committed to the education of the Kenyan child when it is at the same time reluctant to fund the education sector,” Mr Sossion said at Koibeyon Mixed Secondary School in Bomet during a prize-giving ceremony.
He said the union submitted its proposals to the Treasury on March 1 to have the funds factored in the next budget.
Besides the allowances, the chairman said they had proposed Sh15.2 billion for recruitment of 40,000 new teachers, Sh5 billion for employment of early childhood education teachers and Sh4 billion for promotions.
“But because the only language that the government understands in a bid to have the demands implemented is a strike, the union has no other better option but to go for it,” he said.

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