This archive report was first published on 14 October 2019.
On October 14, 2019, a court case involving 13 former senior Kenya Power executives began, with the executives suing the utility firm over their retrenchment in 2015.
The executives claim they were declared redundant following a reorganisation plan disguised as voluntary early retirement, and are demanding over Sh200 million they claim was underpayment when their jobs were terminated.
According to their lawyer, Judith Guserwa, Kenya Power discriminated against the executives on failure to comply with its own human resource manual, failing to give them equal treatment with other employees and retiring them on unfavourable terms.
"Kenya Power had indeed identified and targeted the claimants whom it coerced into applying for the voluntary early retirement and offered them less favourable terms than those they were entitled to," said Mr Guserwa.
The executives, who had served for between 17 and 35 years, are demanding Sh267,316,272 in outstanding payment of salaries, balance of severance pay in terms of the human resource manual, bonus payment for the year 2014 and 2015.
Kenya Power, through the law firm of Hamilton Harrison & Mathews Advocates, argues that the claimants were not coerced into applying for the voluntary early retirement and that the terms were not discriminatory as alleged.
Judgment will be delivered on October 31.
