• The MP said internationalisation of universities in Kenya has been challenging because of rigid laws.
• Kanyinga said the government needs to work with vice chancellors to address the financial woes affecting universities in Kenya.
Image: BRIAN OTIENO
An MP has called for the change of law to allow universities to import equipment tax-free.
Marakwet West MP Timothy Kipchumba, a member of the National Assembly Education committee, said the tax policy has been unsupportive of university education.
“Why should we tax equipment that are meant to benefit our institutions? We need to revisit our legislations so that we can amend,” he said.
Kipchumba spoke on Friday on the sidelines of the first biennial Kenya Universities Funding Conference in Mombasa.
The MP said internationalisation of universities in Kenya has been challenging because of rigid laws.
He said lecturers from abroad have to go through very rigorous and cumbersome processes for them to be approved to teach in Kenya.
“That means we cannot internationalise our universities,” Kipchumba said.
He said most universities have grown because of exporting and importing knowledge.
For Kenyan universities to have an international outlook, they have to import knowledge through lecturers from other countries, he said.
The Marakwet West MP said the requirement that partnership agreements between Kenyan and foreign universities have to be signed by the Attorney General only serves to make the process slow and time consuming.
“That thing can be relegated to other agencies to give approvals,” Kipchumba said.
He also blasted public universities, saying they are not aggressive and innovative enough.
“They should be able to digitise some of their programmes, be more proactive in offering online learning programmes and adopt an open university model so that they can grow and have that global touch,” the MP said.
Universities Fund Board chairperson Karuti Kanyinga said bureaucracy discourages universities from aggressively sourcing their own funds.
“This is what we call lack of supportive research infrastructure, which is one of our undoings,” he said.
Kanyinga said the government needs to work with vice chancellors to address the financial woes affecting universities in Kenya.
Kipchumba said the biggest problem is that the economy is not doing well and this affects the amount of funds allocated for university education.
He said the removal of parallel programmes in university education had also affected the institutions' funding.
Kipchumba further said capping to admit students to university should be abolished.
He said students in the country should be allowed to take up courses of their choice.
“If you qualify to take law but you have not attained the cut mark, you should be given an option to undertake a parallel programme in a university of your choice as long as you have the money,” Kipchumba said.
Denying such students the opportunity eventually affects the funding of universities.
“Let able students take a course of their preference. If a student gets an A- and the cut off for medicine which they wanted is A, and the student is able to pay for himself, let that student undertake that course,” he said.
Kipchumba said the National Assembly Education committee will work closely with the Presidential Working Party on Education Reforms to relook, revisit and revise all the cumbersome laws that affect universities.
He said the committee will also look at the budget allocated for higher education in Kenya, with a view to having it increased.
The allocation has been reducing over the years.
Kipchumba said the universities should form a directorate of international affairs to source funds.
“Apart from the local revenue, they should also get some funds from outside the country,” he said.
Kipchumba said the committee has committed to increasing funding for higher education.
The MP also echoed the Kenya National Union of Teachers, which proposed that those with grade C be allowed to teach in JSS.
“The biggest problem with the Junior Secondary School is staffing. Grade 6 students are taught around 14 subjects and one teacher does all that. There is insufficient infrastructure in those institutions,” he said.
“Let those with C teach in JSS. That is ideally a primary school.”