Lecturers at Technical University of Kenya (TUK) have recently held back the release of students’ exam results as a form of protest against the delayed payment of their salaries. This action was taken in response to the prolonged delay in receiving their September salaries, as confirmed in a letter dated October 19 by the University registrar, Hesbon Nyagowa.
The letter acknowledged the financial constraints leading to the delay and assured staff members that efforts were underway to resolve the issue as quickly as possible. Despite the challenges, the management urged the staff to remain patient.
“The university management is making every effort to ensure that the staff members at the university receive their September 2023 within the shortest time possible,” read the letter in part.
The development has emerged just a couple of months before the scheduled graduation ceremony for both degree and diploma students. TUK had already communicated the necessary prerequisites for the graduation, with a specific deadline of December 1 for departmental approvals. Only those students approved by their respective departments by this date would be eligible to participate in the ceremony.
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The university intends to post the list of potential graduands on its website, pending approval by the senate. However, the current situation with the withheld exam results has the potential to disrupt these graduation plans. The approval of exam results is a crucial step in the process, and any delay caused by the ongoing protest could complicate matters for the university administration.
In March of this year, the University Academic Staff Union (UASU) warned that public universities were facing a crisis due to the government’s delayed release of funds. UASU expressed concerns about the financial difficulties faced by university faculty members, known as “dons.”
UASU’s Organizing Secretary, Onesmus Mutio, urgently called for action, indicating that if immediate measures were not taken, university staff might go on strike. This concern was shared across all public universities, where faculty members were struggling with financial challenges.
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Mutio explained that such funding delays had not occurred before and had reached a critical point. Accumulating unpaid salaries for several months posed a severe threat to the stability of academic activities in public universities. It remained to be seen how the government and relevant authorities would respond to this issue to avoid disrupting higher education.
