Traditionally, trade unions have played central roles in improving the welfare of low-income workers. Organised labour movements elsewhere have delivered better remuneration for wage earners through collective bargaining. The Kenyan labour market has faced turbulence, resulting in job losses through retrenchment and even salary cuts.

Since the beginning of the year, several companies have announced plans to lay off workers due to the challenging economic times.

In March, oil marketing company Ola Energy said it was laying off workers in its Kenyan operations as it restructures to boost profits and local market share.

In the same month, KK Security cited the rising cost of operations, recent legislative changes, and increased minimum wage requirements as key factors for the decision to declare redundancies.

Other firms that have announced redundancies include G4S, Base Titanium, Twiga Foods, Proctor and Gamble, Unga Group, CIC Insurance, Posta Kenya, Radio Africa, Standard Group, Amref and De La Rue, with the latter laying ff 300 workers as it exited Kenya.

The Central Bank forecasts that the private sector plans to retrench at least 15 percent of their workforces due to the high cost of living and punitive taxes.

Breadwinners are continuing to lose jobs even as the political class and policymakers sit on car rooftops claiming that the economy was doing well and blaming their failures on their predecessors.

President William Ruto’s regime has insisted on robbing employed Kenyans of their hard-earned morsel of bread through levies whose primary motive is thievery by State officials.

The ordinary Kenyan worker’s salary has become the primary source of revenue for politicians and the ruling elite.

The pay slip no longer carries an iota of dignity. Because of multiple financial obligations that force them to buy expensive debt, most workers live under the frightening shadow of pecuniary embarrassment.

But who speaks for the Kenyan worker? We hold the view that the unholy axis between COTU boss Francis Atwoli and President Ruto is not healthy for Kenyan workers. Atwoli has fast morphed into a puppet of the State and rendered the labour movement a theatre of the absurd and senility. Something needs to be fixed. And Kenyans know it.