By Azael Masese
Thousands of teachers who retired from service are languishing in poverty following the Government’s failure to pay them their pensions.
By the start of 2018, Teacher Service Commission (TSC) had forwarded 2,918 pension claims to the Directorate of Pension at the National Treasury for processing and possible payment.
The figure is set to rise as the teacher employer forwards the claims virtually every month.
In 2017 alone, 5,822 pension claims were forwarded to the Directorate of Pension for possible processing and payment.
“To date, there is no single sign that they will ever be paid as there are some pending cases, dating back to 2014 and which have not been cleared,” noted KNUT National Treasurer John Matiang’i.
He said that some of the teachers have since passed on while chasing the benefits.
According to a survey conducted by KNUT, the process of pursuing the benefits has proved a maze leading to stress related diseases to the retirees.
“With these findings, there is urgent need to reassess the strategies employed in responding to the retirement needs of teachers in the country,” said Matiang’i.
The teachers union proposes amending the Pensions Act to empower TSC to be paying the pensions dues immediately a teacher retires, instead of forwarding the claims to the National Treasury where it takes ages for the affected teacher to get his/her rightful dues.
“In the amendments, we also propose that retired teachers should be retained on the TSC payroll until such a time that their dues are fully paid up.
The teachers find it difficult to meet their basic needs like clearing medical bills, travel expenses, general upkeep, clearing loans, school fees and even completing development projects,” Matiang’i said.
Terming it sad, disgusting, he said the retirees should not be subjected to a life of untold suffering despite their contribution to improve the country’s education sector.
More so, retired teachers due to their meager pension pay should be retained on both NHIF and the TSC source medical scheme to continue benefitting from the medical insurance schemes until death.
“We have about 22,000 of our former members who have been pushing for their pension since 2003 and they could have been paid Sh16.7 billion by now,” he told Education News.
The Sh16.7 billion pay deal was successfully negotiated by KNUT in 1997 and under it, all teachers serving and those who were on leave pending retirement were awarded lump-sum pay over and above their monthly salaries. However, some of these teachers have not been paid their dues.
The National Assembly’s Education Committee had promised to propose an amendment to the Pensions law to enable TSC handle teachers after retirement.
The committee chaired by Tindiret MP Julius Melly, a teacher by profession, seeks to end the agony of waiting several years to get their pensions.
