Trouble is brewing at the Kenya Literature Bureau (KLB) with the parastatal and its chief executive officer facing multiple suits in court over payment disputes, discrimination, ethnicity and unfair treatment at the workplace.

The latest case, to be heard on Tuesday, is seeking several orders among them a declaration that the managing director Victor Lomaria is in office illegally having completed his second and final term at KLB last year.

In the petition, Ms Catherine Wanjiru Njuguna also seeks orders to quash a new organisational structure at KLB and appointments made by the board, arguing that the move is unconstitutional as the approval of Public Service Commission (PSC) was never sought.

Employment and Labour Relations court judge Anna Ngibuini Mwaure certified the petition as urgent and directed the matter be heard on July 9.

“That an order be directed to the 1st respondent (KLB) to carry out competitive and seamless recruitment of its new managing director and other staff, strictly in compliance with the law and the constitution,” she said in the petition.

Privatisation

KLB is among the 11 parastatals earmarked for privatisation but opposition party ODM challenged the plan by the Kenya Kwanza administration.

Ms Wanjiru further accused KLB of implementing new HR instruments or structure without seeking approval by the PSC, which has powers to approve, review and make recommendations with regard to human resource policies and practices of employees.

The staff were informed that the board approved the re-organisation of the organisational structure to ‘align to the core activities’.

Among the changes were technical functions of publishing and production were reorganised under the publishing and production directorate for alignment and proper coordination of activities.

The business support functions of finance, marketing, business development, customer service and planning were placed under the finance and commercial services directorate in order to “enhance synergy and effective utilisation and coordination of shared resources”.

Ms Wanjiru revealed that KLB staff were not involved in the formulation and development of the new KLB structure used to make the appointments.

“It is clear that the impugned HR instruments, 2024 which contain the organisations structure referred above, did not undergo any public participation and stakeholder involvement including the union, non-management employees, management staff, senior management and board of management,” Ms Wanjiru said.

The petitioner further says Mr Lomaria was appointed in September 2016 and finished his second and final term of three years in September 2022 and is, therefore, not authorised to transact business on behalf of KLB.

New HR instruments

She further said a number staff are on temporary terms despite being supposed to be given permanent tenure. However, they were overlooked and the MD allegedly handpicked his preferred candidates without embracing competiveness and merit.

Ms Wanjiru wants the court to stop the implementation of the new HR instruments and appointments contained in an internal memo dated June 28, 2024.

The new appointments amount to a disingenuous attempt to hoodwink the staff members and the court into approving irregular and un-procedural promotions of a favoured few individuals without the requisite qualifications and track-record of performance contrary to Fair Administrative Action Act and criteria on appointments in the public sector,”

She said the board of directors approved the appointment of junior staff to act in senior positions and ignored qualification and seniority of other members of staff. In a separate case, 35 unionised employees have accused KLB of discrimination and unfair treatment compared to staff who are not union members.

The employees, who are members of the Kenya Union of printing, Publishing and Allied Workers (Kupripupa), also want the court to compel their employer to pay them Sh16.9 million, which they claim is salary increment for a period of 21 months.

“The respondent has constantly given the petitioners unequal treatment compared to other staff of the same rank,” the employees said in the petition

The employees also want KLB stopped from discriminating against them in respect of their employment contracts, audience and participation as well as pension scheme, among other issues, pending the hearing and determination of the case.

Collective Bargaining Agreement

They submitted that the employer has caused the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) with the union to stall. And since the CBA has not been concluded, it has greatly disadvantaged them because the new CBA is already overdue.

“The respondent is unwilling to execute the said CBA causing delays thereof because all efforts to prevail the respondent to do so including correspondence and proceedings before the Labour Commissioner have been futile,” Mr Fredrick Koech said in an affidavit.

He said when union members apply for emergency funds, for example, it is declined while a request from a non-union staff is granted promptly.

Mr Koech said in an affidavit that the employer has discriminated against them by failing to promote them for the past five years yet the same has been done for non-union staff.

The workers accused the employer of failing or refusing to pay them their rightful and reasonable overtime dues and instead, purported to apply rates that are different and lower for union members compared to their comparative staff members who allegedly bowed to pressure and pulled out of the union.

“The respondent has thus offended sections 17 of the Employment Act provides that an employer shall pay the entire amount of wages earned or payable to an employee in respect of work done,” he said.

It is their argument that they are entitled to over time that is payable for services rendered at the rate of 1.5 times the regular hourly pay. For every hour worked beyond the regular 8 hours a day, entitles them 1.5 times of hourly wage.