peaking during a press conference on Friday, Secretary General Tom Odege stressed that differences of opinion should be ironed out as quickly as possible for its benefits to be realised/FILE
Speaking during a press conference on Friday, Secretary General Tom Odege stressed that differences of opinion should be ironed out as quickly as possible for its benefits to be realised.
He expressed the commitment of the union’s workers in supporting the process.
“As a union, we have been very clear and we are not going to change. We voted for the Constitution of Kenya and we accepted devolution to be there. It will be something wrong for us to kill devolution. Devolution was brought in to bring services closer to the people,” Odege stated.
“So as we are devolving our services closer to the people, what we want is support so that we can help deliver services and improve the economy of the Republic of Kenya,” he said.
He further urged leaders to put their differences aside and unite in their endeavours to deliver efficient services to Kenyans.
“But we cannot fight a system which you voted in and when it is being implemented you start stopping it. If corruption is in it, let us fight on how to eradicate it. If there is inefficiency, let us fight the inefficiency but we must team up as Kenyans to ensure that devolution succeeds,” he stated.
The union in the meantime pointed out that it will refund excess union dues that were deducted from their members in the health sector from Homa Bay and Kirinyaga during the transfer of the payroll system to County Governments.
Odege indicated that some of their members have been subjected to double deductions while others suffered reductions up to three times their dues.
He assured those affected that the union will ensure that they get their money back as soon as possible.
“As a union we deduct 1.5 percent of the basic salary as union dues. Now because these people used our codes and rates they ended up deducting the same so we received two double deduction of the same amount of 1.5 percent and for some, we received even three from one member. It’s injurious to the member and we must go an extra mile and refund the amount,” he explained.
He urged union members to be vigilant as to any irregularity that may occur in their pay.
“As a union we are committed to serve our members regardless of the level of their deployment whether at the national or county government we are on the process of formalizing our arrangement of work with the council of Governors. We met early this week and we will be meeting by next week to formalize the arrangement of representation at the county government,” he outlined.
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