It is tough luck for five Kemri scientists who were axed when taps of donor-funded projects they were working on ran dry as the employment court sided with the institution.
The five were long-serving employees of Kemri in various health research programmes, having worked for 18 years, nine years, and the rest for seven years.
They were engaged on contractual basis and their terms were renewed yearly depending on the availability of donors funding for the programmes they were doing.
Court documents say that the funding for the projects mostly came from US Presidential Emergency for AIDS Relief (Pepfar) through Centre for Disease Control in Kenya, and finally by any other funding entity. Between 2016 and 2020, their salaries were paid directly by Maryland University, the grant winner.
The next five-year grant to support staff salaries was won by Amref, the papers say. This was to run from October 2020 to September 2025. Amref gave contracts of three months from October 2020. This was followed by nine months contracts from January to September 2021.
When their nine months contracts elapsed Amref moved them to KEMRI to process the HIV/EID/TB staff salaries.
The five claimed in court during the intervening period when handling of their salaries was being transitioned to Amref, Kemri’s labs boss allegedly tried to intervene to alter their contracts.
Here, they were given one-year contracts running between October 2021 and September 2022.
But trouble began in August last year when the five received communication from Kemri that there was reduced funding for 2022-2023 and that the agency would downsize its staff.
The five would reach out to Amref to confirm if it had indeed indicated reduced funding on the projects. They claimed Amref told them there was no such issue and that Kemri had developed a policy to reduce staff and increase salary for those remaining.
The net effect of the new policy, they told the court, was to eliminate them and replace them with casuals and interns.
In court, they complained that their right to legitimate expectation under Article 47 of the Constitution was violated by the termination because “they expect to have their contracts renewed under the grant ending in the year 2025.”
They said there was no reduced funding for the project they were working on and that it was a fabrication by Kemri “aimed at clearing out long-serving staff, and replacing them with preferred candidates”, and that “the outcome [of the new recruitment for their replacement] reflected nepotism, conflict of interest, lack of integrity, and lack of consideration for marginalized tribes.”
But in its response, Kemri refuted the claims by the five as largely misinformed and lacking cogent evidence to prop their case.
It rejected claims that staff working on various programmes were handled by the funding entity, saying that Kemri always remained in charge of the human resource irrespective of who was giving the money.
It said the Amref project in question ran in phases. The third phase that was to run between October 1 and September 2023 suffered reduced funding commitment from the previous Sh104 million to Sh94 million.
Kemri said that it had no option but to let go a section of workers to accord with the declined funding.
The court in an August 30, 2023 judgment sided with the research entity, finding that with reduced project funding Kemri had its hands tied and had to let the five go.
“They were kept in limited-term contracts, because their contracts were tied down to their employer-donor funding contracts. It would be illogical for the court to find that the respondent acted in violation of the petitioners’ right to fair labour practices and non-discrimination,” the judgment by James Rika reads.
