Governor Kananu Appoints New Public Service Board Members

As county workers set to down tools on Monday due to unresolved grievances

By Adieri Mulaa

Nairobi governor Anne Kananu has appointed Thomas Mweu Kasoa as chairperson of Nairobi City County Public Service Board.

The governor has also appointed Mr Osman G. Abdullahi, Mr Robert Wamaya and Ms Faith K. Kalui to be members of the Board.

The appointments are contained in a special issue of the Kenya Gazette dated 29 June, 2022. According to the gazette notice, the Board members will serve for a term of six years.

On 22 June, 2022, a special sitting of Nairobi City County Assembly chaired by the House Speaker Benson Mutura approved the governor’s nominees.

During the plenary, Members of the County Assembly queried why names of the three Board members were not included in the communication which invited them for the special sitting.

Apart from the Board chairman’s name which was tabled, the Assembly was cagey on a report of the Sectoral Committee on Labour and Social Welfare, which was said to contain names of three other nominees to the Board but were not disclosed in the plenary.

An attempt by the media to get the Labour committee report containing identities of the shadowy nominees has remained futile. It is not clear whether the three Board members who have been appointed by Governor Kananu were vetted or appear in the controversial Labour report.

In the special sitting, several MCAs had sought to be given identities of the trio to be able to interrogate their personalities and characters while debating the committee report.

However the majority had their way and the report sailed through without disclosure of the names.

City Hall has operated without a substantive Board for more that one year, grounding many staff matters. About two weeks ago, Nairobi City County Assembly was told the Board was disabled after some key members left.

Kware Ward MCA Rose Ogonda told the House that the former Board operated as a skeleton, without substantive chairman, secretary and requisite quorum to execute its mandate after key members left to join the Nairobi Metropolitan Services.

The Board comes in handy, with a full tray of pending grievances that have been tabled by Nairobi county workers.

“The new Board has a lot of work cut out, especially on promotion of county employees. The out-going Board could not execute its mandate effectively because several members had left”, Kariobangi South MCA Robert Mbatia told the Assembly.

City Hall employees are set to down tools their on Monday 4 July, 2022 over unresolved grievances. Kenya County Government Workers Union wrote to the County Secretary and Head of County Public Service on 22 June, 2022 listing the workers grievances and effectively issued a strike notice.

On Friday, 1 July, 2022, a meeting between the workers Union and the county government management to avert the strike collapsed after the management failed to yield. The Union says the management has been giving employees false promises over their grievances.

Among the grievances is; failure to effect promotions for all eligible employees, persistent salary delays and non-payment of staff allowances.

The Union also accuses the County management of operating intermittent NHIF medical cover, failure to pay premiums and non-remittance of dues.