No Salary Increment For Civil Servants As Gov't Seeks To Tame High Wage Bill

The monthly salary reviews for civil servants will remain the same, as employers have been advised against doing so to control excessive labor costs. 

 The move will help achieve fiscal sustainability and harmonization, according to Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) Chairperson Lyn Mengich, who made this statement on Monday during the 3rd National Wage Bill Conference at the Bomas of Kenya.

"Affordability and fiscal sustainability are a key consideration in any collective bargaining negotiations. Employers are therefore advised not to consider any review of financial items where there is no demonstration of the ability to afford and sustain a review among other considerations," she stated.

Mengich said that all institutions should offer salaries within the 50th percentile midpoint, and those that still need to reach that level should do so as soon as possible.

"Institutions above this positioning will retain their salary structures whereas those below will progressively be moved towards the 50th percentile," she added.

A payment strategy used to achieve simplified compensation for all public employees is the 50th percentile midpoint. The SRC decides what the point is. 

The SRC advises the employer to implement a salary set at or close to the required median if a public servant is paid less than the midpoint. 

During the same conference, Felix Koskei, the head of public service, asked employees to be patient while the government works to solve the failing economy. 

He said that the country must live within its means because the government is struggling to pay civil servants their salaries and cannot afford to pay them more.

"We urge all the employers and employees of the unions to realise the state of the economy that this country has, the measures that the government has taken to turn around the economy and also consider that at this time it is not possible to look for additional of salaries," he said.

As President William Ruto previously stated, the government must exercise fiscal restraint and refrain from paying physicians more than the Treasury has authorized. 

Ruto underlined that doctors should accept what has been offered before the deal is pulled, as there will be no more money available to them. 

Physicians have insisted that they will not end their countrywide walkout until their demands—among others—are satisfied.