This archive report was first published on 15 July 2019.
University lecturers in Kenya are facing a high cost of living, with their purchasing power eroded by up to 54 per cent, according to the University Academic Staff Union (Uasu).
On July 15, 2019, Uasu filed a case at the Labour and Industrial Relations Court, citing the need for a salary increase to address the disparities in pay and the high cost of living.
"Most universities give assistant, lecturers, lecturers and senior lecturers similar salary. This does not motivate the lower cadres. It also demoralises and causes lack of enthusiasm and morale among the senior grades," the document filed at the court states.
Uasu argues that the graduate assistant position has never had a consistent grade as the rest of the academic ranks, with some universities hiring them under Grade 10 while others recruited them at Grade 11.
The union has proposed that the anomaly be corrected to accommodate all graduate assistants at public universities, with other grades adopting this coding and logically moving serially upwards.
Uasu is also demanding several allowances, including house, academic, professional, and book allowances.
According to the union, a graduate assistant currently earning a monthly salary of Sh83,598 should get between Sh195,656 and Sh306,006, while an assistant don earning between Sh83,598 to 118,348 should take home between Sh300,775 to Sh470,444.
Uasu secretary-general Constantine Wasonga says a professor getting Sh73,715 as house allowance should be paid Sh250,000, an associate professor earning Sh66,344 should be given Sh190,000, while a senior lecturer should get Sh160,000, instead of Sh58,972.
"The rates are comparable to what is paid to certain public employees like MPs, who are getting a monthly house allowance of Sh250,000 on top of a housing grant," he says.
