Lecturers and other university staff have begun a nationwide strike after negotiations between their unions and public university councils failed to resolve a dispute over salaries and the implementation of a new collective bargaining agreement.
The industrial action has disrupted learning and other services in public universities, with staff unions rejecting a proposed 4 per cent annual salary increase as inadequate.
At the centre of the dispute is the 2025–2029 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA), whose immediate implementation the unions are demanding.
The unions maintain that the agreement should be implemented as negotiated rather than replaced or diluted through a separate salary proposal.
The failed talks have now pushed the dispute into industrial action, raising fresh concerns over the impact of the strike on students, academic programmes, examinations and university operations.
The standoff also comes at a difficult time for Kenya's public universities, which have been grappling with financial pressures and demands for improved working conditions.
For lecturers and other university employees, however, the dispute goes beyond the proposed annual increment. They are demanding that the commitments contained in the 2025–2029 CBA be honoured, arguing that negotiated agreements should provide the basis for determining their remuneration and employment conditions.
The councils and the unions now face pressure to return to the negotiating table and find a settlement that can end the disruption.
Until then, thousands of students remain caught in the middle of a labour dispute that threatens to interrupt the academic calendar across the country's public universities.
The strike has once again exposed the delicate balance between the financial constraints facing public universities and the demands of their employees for negotiated pay and improved terms of service.
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