The Kakamega County Public Service Board is again in the spotlight for flawed recruitment procedures.
But three people dodged the question and passed the buck.
The board has previously been criticised for hiring people with fake certificates. Some county officers now want it to clearly explain their employment. It hired 400 community administrators in June last year and issued appointment letters, indicating contracts were to take effect on July 1.
In December, it recalled the letters, issuing fresh ones delaying employment to January 1. It did not explain.
The administrators have also accused the board of wrongly reducing their pay packages. In its job adverts, the board said successful applicants would earn a basic salary of Sh28,000 and another Sh7,000 in allowances. This would bring their gross earning to Sh35,000. In the appointment letters, however, the basic salary was reduced to Sh19,770.
“The county government has deliberately declined to indicate how much commuter, leave and house allowances we’re entitled to, meaning they will pay as they deem fit and not as per the contract,” one administrator said. He spoke on condition of anonymity for fear or reprisal.
Reached for comment, board chairperson Rodah Masaviru referred the Star to chief executive officer Victoria Tumaini.
“Is that so? What I know is that they couldn’t be appointed before the parade and even before receiving the instruments of power. I’m not allowed to comment. The board CEO is the right person to comment,”
Tumaini declined to comment.“The chairperson is the board spokesperson. If the chair can’t speak, then only the governor himself can comment,” she said.
Public Service and Administration executive Beatrice Sabana said, “I can’t answer such a question. The government works through systems so if the letters were issued and withdrawn, there must be a reason. You’d better talk to the Public Service Board because it is they who hire,” she said.
Governor Wycliffe Oparanya had ordered a head count of all county staff and an audit of their academic papers to allow restructuring of his administration and improve services.
The decision followed resignation of a senior county staff member who worked in his office. She had used a fake degree certificate to get the job and left when she realised it had been discovered.
The officer had used her husband, a school principal, as a referee. Oparanya warned that frauds and those found complicit would be prosecuted.