Pension Payouts to 23,487 Retired Teachers Stalled as TSC Blames Treasury for Non-payment.
The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) in Kenya has attributed the delay in payment of pension benefits for 23,487 retired teachers who left service between 1998 and 2003 to the National Treasury.
Speaking before the Senate’s Education Committee, TSC CEO Nancy Macharia said the commission had submitted all relevant documents to the Treasury for payment as required by law.
“The commission has processed all the relevant documents for the 23,487 and submitted to the National Treasury for payment as per the law,” Macharia said.
Macharia added that the affected retirees were benefiting from normal pensions but had not received enhanced pay entitlements because of the cash crises that had affected the government at the time of their retirement.
The petition, which had prompted the Senate’s Education Committee to summon the TSC, was made by a retired teacher who had not been paid for about 20 years since leaving service.
The affected retirees had not benefited from enhanced pay as a result of a 1997 deal between the Kenya National Union of Teachers and the government that was to be implemented in phases.
However, the cash crises that hit the government at the time meant that many of the teachers had retired before benefiting from one of the phases.
Macharia explained that the TSC’s responsibility was to prepare documentation and forward it to the director of the pension for payment.
She also cited various reasons for delayed payments, such as retirees or their beneficiaries taking too long to submit the required documents for processing, or families engaging in disputes over the beneficiaries of the payments.
“The work of the commission is to prepare documentation and forward it to the director of pension. Our work ends at documentation,” the TSC boss said.
The TSC has completed all the necessary paperwork, and the government has been compelled to effect the payment after the teachers won court cases, from the High Court to the Supreme Court in 2015, securing favourable judgments for enhanced pension benefits.
Treasury CS Njunguna Ndungú was summoned to explain the non-payment, but Macharia said the TSC had fulfilled its part of the bargain and that the ball was now in the Treasury’s court to make the payments.