Lecturers to go as Egerton drops 8 degrees

More than 200 employees of cash-strapped Egerton University are staring at job losses after the institution scrapped eight degree courses on Tuesday.

This was revealed by Vice-Chancellor Isaac Ongubo Kibwage during a staff meeting at Kilimo Hall in Njoro Campus.

Prof Kibwage also announced that the university will declare staff in some departments redundant to cut costs, once a criterion to exit them is established.

“Unfortunately, we will be letting some staff go. Some departments are overstaffed and we will be rationalising them. This will definitely lead to job redundancies,” Prof Kibwage said.

The eight degree programmes that are being discontinued have not been attracting students at the institution,the VC said.

Cutting costs

Prof Kibwage said these were part of efforts to infuse financial stability at the institution while countering risks such as frequent strikes.

“The university has identified the eight degree programmes which we intend to scrap as part of reorganising the institution. Lecturers and other staff in those departments will unfortunately have to exit,” he added.

The move is aimed at managing the bloated wage bill at the institution, which has been struggling financially.

The programmes targeted are Bachelor of Industrial Technology, Bachelor of Technology in Civil Engineering, Bachelor Of Science (soil, environment and land use management), Bachelor Of Science (dairy technology and management), Bachelor Of Science (wildlife management and enterprise), Bachelor Of Science (integrated forest resource management), Bachelor Of Science (dairy land resources management) and Bachelor Of Science (in applied aquatic science).

According to the VC, the academic staff takes the lion’s share of the wage bill at Sh135 million per month followed by the non-teaching Kenya University Staff Union (Kusu) and Kenya Union of Domestic, Hotels, Educational Institutions, Hospitals and Allied Workers (Kudheiha), who take Sh93million and Sh16.5 million respectively.

The management is said to consume Sh3.5million in salaries every month.

“This is what we need to pay full salaries. The government gives us Sh185 million per month, we raise through fees an average of Sh26 million in a month. This is against a payroll of Sh248 million. That is why we are unable to fully pay salaries for our staff. They need to understand the dilemma and avoid downing their tools,” Prof Kibwage revealed.

Huge debts

On Tuesday, Prof Kibwage admitted that the university is grappling with huge debts. The institution is in the midst of its worst financial crisis, struggling to pay its massive wage bill of more than Sh200 million while also clearing a debt of Sh9 billion.

In a recent session with journalists, Prof Kibwage said the institution had issued a notice to declare some of the positions redundant to cut the wage bill.

Reacting to the vice-chancellor's address,the local chapter of the University Academic Staff Union faulted the redundancy notice, which officials said is ill timed and unworkable.

Chapter Secretary-General Grace Kibue, however, urged the management to ensure that the process is fair, transparent and verifiable.

“It is our hope that we will be engaged and given the justifications as well as the proposals, which will be subjected to scrutiny by all members before the union can make an appropriate decision,” said Dr Kibue.

Insufficient funds

By last year, Egerton University’s debt burden ballooned and hit the Sh9 billion mark as it continued to struggle to run its operations due to insufficient funds.

The debt includes pending bills as of June 2022.

The Njoro-based institution depends almost entirely on the exchequer and, in the current financial year, the government capped Egerton’s annual budget at Sh3.7 billion against a requirement of Sh5 billion, leading to a deficit of Sh1.3 billion.

As of 2019, the debt burden was Sh6 billion but, since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, it has almost doubled as the management made frantic efforts to rescue the sinking institution with little success.

Not even the new government under President William Ruto seems to give the institution any hope of extending the rescue plan, which has seen the institution reduce lecturers’ salaries by 40 per cent.