Treasury Cabinet Secretary John Mbadi has distanced his ministry from the ongoing lecturers’ strike, insisting that the Treasury has already fulfilled its financial obligations and pointing the finger at the Ministry of Education and the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) for the stalemate.
Speaking during an interview on Citizen TV on Saturday, Mbadi explained that the Treasury had already disbursed the money allocated to lecturers under the agreed Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA).
He stressed that the root of the dispute lies in miscommunication and disagreements between the Ministry of Education and the SRC, not the Treasury.
“On the matter of the lecturers’ strike, the problem is not with the Treasury,” Mbadi clarified. “The real issue is a lack of understanding between the Ministry and the Salaries and Remuneration Commission. That’s where this dispute needs to be settled.”
He outlined that in 2023, the government had allocated Ksh4.3 billion to address lecturers’ payments. The funds were initially disbursed under Article 223 of the Constitution before being regularized through the Supplementary Budget.
For the current financial year 2025/26, the Treasury committed Ksh2.7 billion, which, according to Mbadi, was released at the beginning of the year despite being scheduled for gradual disbursement across the year.
The CS questioned the timing of the strike, pointing out that the payments in dispute date back several years. He suggested that it was the responsibility of the Education and Labour ministries to determine the actual amounts owed.
“I have also heard claims about how much lecturers are owed, but I don’t have all the facts,” Mbadi said. “That is a matter for the Ministries of Education and Labour.
From my understanding, these payments were due between 2017 and 2021. If they were not paid back then, I don’t know why the lecturers waited until 2025 to raise these concerns.”
Despite this, Mbadi assured that the government was committed to resolving the strike by bringing the relevant agencies together to establish clarity on the outstanding balances.
The lecturers’ strike, which has now lasted almost a month, has disrupted academic activities in all public universities nationwide. The deadlock revolves around Ksh7.9 billion that lecturers say is owed to them.
According to the SRC, Ksh7.2 billion has already been paid out through annual salary increments.
The government further insists that the outstanding balance is only Ksh624 million. Lecturers, however, maintain that the figures are inaccurate and continue to demand the full Ksh7.9 billion, prolonging the standoff that has paralyzed higher education across the country.
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