The Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) has raised fresh concerns over political interference in the recruitment and promotion of teachers, warning the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) to uphold merit and professionalism in its hiring process.
Speaking in Kajiado, KNUT National Deputy Chairperson Malel Lang’at claimed that politicians had sidelined qualified graduates, leaving thousands of trained teachers jobless despite shortages in schools.
“As a union, we are saying that teachers should be given priority and a chance to be employed without any bias that has been in place due to politics,” Lang’at stated.
He further alleged that politicians had taken recruitment manipulation to the extreme, collecting employment letters directly from TSC offices and distributing them at rallies or “auctioning” them for political mileage.
Lang’at urged the new TSC CEO, Evaleen Mitei, to restore integrity in the process and eliminate malpractices that have eroded confidence in the commission.
Separately, KNUT Kajiado Branch Secretary Elly Korinko asked the commission to safeguard hardship allowances and protect affirmative action policies designed for remote and marginalized regions.
Korinko warned that tampering with these provisions would demoralize teachers working in hardship counties and worsen staffing challenges in the affected areas.
Concerns over irregularities at the TSC extend beyond recruitment. Just last month, Auditor General Nancy Gathungu flagged serious payroll anomalies for the financial year ending June 2024.
According to her report, the commission overpaid some teachers by Ksh433.9 million due to inefficiencies linked to manual reporting and payment systems. Out of this, only Ksh222.3 million had been recovered, leaving a pending balance of Ksh211.6 million.
KNUT insisted that political influence and financial mismanagement undermine professionalism in the teaching service and called for urgent reforms to restore credibility in the sector.
 has raised fresh concerns over political interference in the recruitment and promotion of teachers, warning the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) to uphold merit and professionalism in its hiring process.){kind=link}