Kenya's Most Authoritative Political Newspaper

Citizen Weekly

Monday 9 February 2015

Nyamira county workers unconvinced on jobs

Panic and fear has gripped employees of Nyamira county assembly after the assembly service board announced that it could demote some of the workers who are holding key departmental positions which they did not merit or qualify to hold.
In a hastily planned meeting held at the assembly by members of the county assembly service board  that included  speaker Joash Nyamache, Daniel Orina, county assembly clerk and Jerusa Momanyi,a member of the public to the service board,  the trio however assured the workers who looked tense that none of them would be sacked as per the initial plans.
The county assembly had recruited over 70 workers instead of 36, a factor which has raised the wage bill of the assembly.
Addressing the workers, Nyamoko said that 14 departmental workers who did not qualify would be relocated to where they belong and others would be promoted to take their positions.
These demotions would mean that those affected would now miss benefits which they were getting and enjoying due to their positions.
Sources at the county assembly told Weekly Citizen that plans to shelve the sacking were reached after members of the county assembly strongly opposed sackings.
The workers were brought by the reps and are their close relatives such as brothers, sisters and cousins while others are the reps’ girlfriends.
Orina said that serious alignments would be done so that the workers are relocated to where their services are most needed.
It also emerged that the county assembly had hired experts from the public service commission to assist them identify suitable persons to head various departments in the assembly where a colossal amount of money was used.
Orina said now that none was going to be sacked, the workers should embark on serious service delivery failure to which they would be disciplined as stipulated by the law.
Some of the workers said it would be against the law if the board reduces their salaries.
One of the workers said that some of them have already committed their pay slips by taking up huge loans and therefore to reduce their salaries and allowances would leave them under the mercy of heartless auctioneers.
On the issue of working as casuals, the workers asserted that they have letters of appointment and questioned why the board was taking too long to confirm them.
“As far as we are concerned, we are permanent and pensionable because we have worked beyond the six months as per the law,” a worker stated.
Investigations revealed that the morale of workers at the assembly has reached its lowest ebb after word leaked out three weeks ago that they were working as casuals and 40 of them were going to be axed.
Members of the public have also put members of the assembly on the spot for taking advantage of their positions to recruit their relatives and friends at the expense of those who had better qualifications.
Led by John Ongera, they said that three quarters of the workers at the assembly were related to the MCAs in one way and that is why they were not working hard because their relative reps would defend them in case of any complaints

No comments:

Post a Comment