Kenyan teachers are celebrating after Supreme Court declined to stop the enforcement of a lower court’s order that their employer pay them higher salaries.
The teachers now expect to be paid a raise of between 50 per cent and 60 per cent while the appeal filed by the Teachers Service Commission is heard by the Court of Appeal.
The TSC which is the teachers body is challenging an award given by the labour court saying that it cannot afford to pay the increase awarded to the teachers.
The dispute over teachers’ pay goes back 18 years, with a pay deal struck in 1997 only partially fulfilled.
The government has not yet reacted and it is still not clear where the new money will come from.
The teachers expressed their happiness about the court’s decision, which means that the lowest paid teacher should now get $240 month.
Teachers havethreatened to strike if the pay rise is not included in their next salary payment which is this month’s salary.
The decision by the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, came after the TSC paid teachers their August salaries under the old rates.
Kenya National Union of Teachers Secretary-General Wilson Sossion threatened unspecified action if the payroll is not amended to reflect the higher pay.
TSC says implementing the new deal would cost taxpayers Sh73 billion over the four-year period covered by the deal. The Treasury would have to seek ways of finding Sh17 billion to implement the award between now and June next year, according to the government.
The lowest-paid teacher in Job Group G would earn a maximum of Sh26,707, up from Sh16,692, while the highest-paid in Job Group R would walk home with a monthly pay of Sh163,634, up from Sh109,089.
