Universities staff layoffs inevitable

Public universities have embarked on a massive reduction of their staff as institutions of higher learning continue to struggle with financial debts.

In the last four years, lecturers and non-academic staff in older universities were the most affected as the universities battle to stay afloat.

For instance, 382 staff members were fired from the University of Nairobi between 2017 and 2020. The number of staff in 2017 stood at 5008 and by 2020, the number of staff came down to 4,626.

The number of staff at the Moi University has dropped from 3,011 in 2017 to 2,783 in 2020, meaning that 228 were laid off. However, some staff members have left the institutions due to natural transitions.

In Egerton University, the staff reduced from 1995 to 1821, in Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology went down from 2,727 to 2,732 while in Maseno University the number of staff from 1,276 to 1,235.

Other universities that have reduced their staff include the University of Eldoret from 1,235 to 1,231, Laikipia University 575 to 550 staff, Technical University of Mombasa (TUM) from 729 to 670, Multimedia from 421 to 406, the University of Kabianga from 595 to 575, Karatina University from 417 to 402, South Eastern Kenya University from 510 to 491 staff members.

Due to the financial crisis coupled with a reduced number of students joining the universities, the majority of the universities have opted to have fewer staff members on the payroll, increasing their workload.

What data revealed

This has resulted in academic staff teaching more courses than usual, while in other universities, they have cheaper labour by engaging casual workers.

The data is revealed in a recently released report by a Joint Technical Committee that comprised of members of the Universities academic staff union (Uasu), Kenya Universities Staff Union (Kusu), the Kenya Union of Domestic, Hostels, Educational Institutions and Hospital Workers (Kudheiha) and the Inter-Public Universities Councils Consultative Forum (IPUCCF).

New universities such as Koitalel Samoei University has only 46 staff members, Bomet University (76), Turkana University(98), Tharaka University(85), Alupe University College (76), while Tom Mboya University College has 79 staff members.

Even though the total staff count in all the 38 public universities has increased from 31,127 to 31,373, most universities have less than 1000 staff with the majority of institutions having less than 500 staff members, both academic and non-academic staff.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) proposed major reforms in public universities aimed at addressing the acute financial crisis in the institutions.

Among the recommendations were for universities to reduce staff and look for alternative income streams.