The Central Organization of Trade Unions Secretary-General Francis Atwoli has called on President Uhuru Kenyatta to dismiss officials who have reportedly failed to gazette the appointment of Rose Omamo to the NSSF board.
In a statement on Thursday, Atwoli expressed his displeasure with what he termed as disrespect and defiance by the CS for the ministry of labour.
“It has come to our attention that the ministry of labour has bluntly refused to gazette the appointment of Rose Omamo to the NSSF board as directed by the President on May 1,” Atwoli said.
“In this act of defiance and contempt, both the cabinet and principal secretary of the ministry of labour has disobeyed the president by delegating responsibility upwards.”
According to Atwoli, the President ordered the labour CS to gazette COTU nominees to the board only for the CS to pass this responsibility to the head of public service.
"Secondly, in their act of disrespecting the President the ministry of labor has embarked on a misinformation campaign whereby they have since changed positions on why they didn't gazette Rose Omamo as a worker's representative to the NNS board," Atwoli added.
He also claimed that there have been disagreements in the ministry of labor over the gazettement of Omamo.
Atwoli said that the ministry of labour has since started a new narrative questioning the capacity of Omamo.
"Against the new narrative by the ministry of labour, Omamo is articulate in all aspects of academic qualifications and equally runs one of the giant unions in Kenya, namely Amalgamated Union of Kenya meta workers which is affiliate of the IndustriALL Global Union which represents over 50 million workers globally in 140 countries," Atwoli added.
President Uhuru Kenya had directed Labour and Social Protection Cabinet Secretary Simon Chelugui to immediately gazette Omamo as COTU’s representative on the National Social Security Fund (NSSF) Board of Trustees on May 1.
Speaking during this year’s Labour Day Celebrations, Uhuru said he would like to see the appointment effected by Wednesday.
