Nairobi News

Unions in the Public Service Sector have threatened to sanction an industrial strike if Parliament approves the proposed Finance bill that seeks to introduce a housing fund levy in civil servants’ pay slips.

The unions include the Kenya University Staff Union (KUSU), Universities Academic Staff Union (UASU), Kenya Medical Practitioners Pharmacist and Dentists Union(KMPDU), Kenya Union of Clinical Officers (KUCO), Kenya National Union of Nurses(KNUN), Kenya Union of Domestic, Hotels, Educational Institutions, Hospitals and Allied Workers(KUDHEIHA), County Government Workers Union(CGWU), Union of Kenya Civil Servants(UKCS).

In an address the media, KUSU Secretary General Dr Charles Mukhwana argued a possible approval of the bill shall overburden workers in the public sector and drive them to lack and poverty.

“The Tax authorities continue to overburden the workers in the public sector whose salaries are deducted at source while doing very little to net those employed in the private sector,” said Mukhwana.

“This over-taxation is going on unabated despite the fact that an employee’s salary is protected by law and that any deduction thereto can only be by mutual consent or through negotiation by workers’ representatives. We demand that Parliament rejects the proposed amendments in the Finance Bill, 2023. Failure to which the public sector unions will consider industrial action and other measures provided in the law,” he continued.

He argued that the housing fund levy, which will become mandatory, yet was ‘purported to be voluntary’, will see ‘total deductions of 52 percent of one’s monthly earnings with the remaining net of 48 percent still subjected to 16 percent value-added tax (VAT) for every purchase of goods and services whose prices are ever increasing’.

“This will leave most employees with pecuniary embarrassment as their earnings are already fully committed. This over-taxation is a huge burden on the public workers and renders them unable to afford basic commodities. The high cost of living makes a public service employee a slave who cannot afford a decent life. We are greatly concerned that we the workers’ representatives have not been consulted on any of these levies, hence a violation of the Constitution and relevant enabling legislations,” he explained.

Dr Constantine Wasonga, UASU Secretary-General said the new proposal amounts to over-taxation.

“The over-taxation by the Kenya Kwanza government has now reached a boiling point. They started with NSSF, then proposed a 2.75 percent increase on NHIF, while the services we get is not commensurate with what we are paying. The government is now proposing three per cent on housing levy, but our members do not want the housing levy,” said Dr Wasonga.

“Is it that the government wats to borrow from workers? We have calculated, and they are saying that contribution is not going to help them. Is the government also going to review the one-third percent rule? what will the employers do? They have nothing to deduct. And which union did the government engage before they came up with this proposal? The burden is too heavy for us,” he said.

Dr Davji Bhimji, KMPDU Secretary General also complained that doctors will have to bear with over sh20,000 deductions from their basic salaries, coming against a backdrop of nonpayment of over Sh2 billion from their CBA signed in 2017, no payment of medical interns employed in January and non-employment of healthcare workers.

“Workers need to be remunerated. we are expecting 80 per cent salary increase based on the period of stagnation, and high inflation, because we have to live. But where our salaries are robbed during the day, and where deductions are put without consultations, it is clear daylight robbery.

We are now at 52 percent. What will make it not climb to 70 percent next year? And what will make it not to be that we will work for free because the government is broke and we are patriots of the goevrnemnt? We are telling the government to try not to raid the pay slip of the worker. It is non-negotiable, it is wrong and can only be pushed back with the strongest strike of labor than ever seen before,” he said.

Besides demanding for parliament to reject the proposed amendments in the finance bill 2023, the unions have also demanded that the government reduces taxes imposed on workers, and engage worker’s representatives in the Public Service Sector to char the way forward. They have also demanded that the government fast track negotiations and implementation of all pending Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBAS).

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