- KUPPET Western Region Secretary Sabala Inyeni has defended KESSHA against parliamentary scrutiny, rejecting its characterisation as a private members’ club.
- Inyeni has argued that KESSHA operates as a professional body with a constitution, legitimate bank accounts and democratic leadership elected every five years.
- Inyeni has maintained that isolated cases of financial misconduct by individual principals should not be used to discredit KESSHA as an organisation.
By Benedict Aoya
Kenya Union of Post Primary Education Teachers (KUPPET) Western Region Secretary Sabala Inyeni has come out strongly in defence of the Kenya Secondary School Heads Association (KESSHA), after a parliamentary committee questioned how public schools’ contributions to the association are used and accounted for.
The National Assembly’s Public Investments Committee on Governance and Education, chaired by Luanda MP Dick Maungu, had resolved to summon KESSHA officials to explain how millions of shillings contributed by public secondary schools are spent.
The committee’s concerns stemmed from an Auditor-General’s report flagging direct school payments to the association as irregular, with Maungu describing KESSHA as “a private members’ club” whose legal basis for receiving public funds remained unclear.
Responding to what he called viral reports on the matter, Inyeni rejected the framing of KESSHA as a private entity, insisting the association is a long-standing professional body rather than an amorphous club.
“We want to make it very clear that KESSHA is a professional body. KESSHA has been with us since independence. KESSHA has existed for as many years as anybody can remember,” he said.
According to Inyeni, KESSHA’s core function is to coordinate both curricular and co-curricular activities for students and teachers, a role he said stretches from the zonal level all the way to the national level. He argued that this contribution is widely recognised within the education sector.
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“Any education administrator in this country, and even the Ministry of Education itself and the Teacher Service Commission, appreciate the role of KESSHA,” he said, adding that the Ministry regards the association as a very strong partner in enhancing the education of children.
Much of the parliamentary committee’s concern centred on whether KESSHA operates within a clear legal and financial structure. Inyeni disputed any suggestion that the association lacks accountability, pointing to its formal governance systems.
“We know KESSHA has a constitution. We know KESSHA has legitimate bank accounts. We know KESSHA has a structured leadership which is democratic in nature,” he said, noting that the association holds elections every five years and that these details are already in the public domain.
He also maintained that funds paid by schools to KESSHA are traceable, pushing back on any implication that the money moves without oversight.
Inyeni argued that even if isolated cases of financial misconduct exist at individual schools, that should not be used to cast doubt on KESSHA as a whole.
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“If there is a head of school or a principal who has misappropriated money, that principal can be brought to book as an individual, without tainting the name of a whole organisation as KESSHA, which we know and which we believe is doing a good job,” he said.
He went further, suggesting that criticism of the association’s role in coordinating education activities amounted to undermining the education sector itself. “If there is anybody who wants to malign KESSHA and call it all sorts of names in the name of auditing funds, we know that is the person who is fighting the education of our children,” he said.
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