- They demand the implementation of a delayed Collective Bargaining Agreement.
- They further fault the university for not remitting more than Sh2 billion statutory deductions.
Image: BY MATHEWS NDANYI
Moi University has shut down its main campus indefinitely and ordered students to leave due to a strike by staff which has paralysed all its operations.
Deputy vice chancellor Joseph Kimengi said in a notice that the university senate had asked all students to vacate from the Eldoret main campus by noon.
He said the students had behaved maturely in the last three days and the management was working to restore normalcy so that learning can resume.
However operations at satellite campuses will continue normally.
Lecturers and other staff of the university are on strike demanding implementation of a delayed Collective Bargaining Agreement.
They have also faulted the university for not remitting more than Sh2 billion statutory deductions, among other grievances.
University council chairman Dr Humphrey Njuguna said they will send home more than half of its 5,000 workers in a staff rationalisation programme caused by deep financial problems, including debts amounting to more than Sh5 billion.
The university will also consider increasing fees from the current Sh16,000 yearly because the money cannot sustain students and its facilities are also in a dilapidated state.
Dr Njuguna said the crisis at the college was caused by a bloated workforce after the number of its students reduced from about 60,000 to less than 27,000 currently following the phase out of the parallel degree programmes three years ago.
He said the university had decided to take painful measures, including sacking of workers, closure of more of its campuses and outsourcing some of its services in cost cutting measures.
“We have to discus with parents and other stakeholders, including the Ministry of Education, because there are facts we cannot avoid like the need to increase fees.”
Dr Njuguna said the collapse of the parallel degree programme and the closure of some campuses caused the university to lose Sh5 billion internal revenue yet the number of staff had remained the same.
He said the council unveiled a plan to save the university from collapse and revive all its operations through income generating activities to supplement dwindling government funding.
The university will use more than 1,000 acres of its land to produce apples on large scale in a venture that will generate more than sh 80 billion after the next four years.
The university has already started the project on 100 acres.
“We have done due diligence and, through research involving the school of agriculture, we are sure we will succeed and revamp the university fully," Dr Njuguna said.
He said the university had no money to implement a new CBA for the workers unless the government intervenes.
“In the position we are in, we cant pay and we won’t pay but we are engaging the government,” he said.
Professor Kosgey denied that the university had been ignoring the plight of its workers.
He said already they had started reducing the accumulated statutory deductions and obligations with financial institutions so that workers access support they need.
Prof Kosgey said the college had no backlogs in payments of salaries except wages for some casual workers. He instead asked them to be patient as their grievances were being addressed.