Kenya Union of Post-Primary Education Teachers (Kuppet) is appealing to Junior Secondary School (JSS) teachers to join their trade union, arguing that it is best suited to be effective in advocating for their interests.

This comes at a time when the JSS teachers are pushing to have their own independent union separate from the two giant teachers’ unions – Kuppet and Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut).

Kuppet Deputy Secretary General Moses Nthurima said their union is the only outfit in the country that advocates for the rights of post-primary teachers and, hence, JSS teachers should automatically be affiliated to them.

Nthurima argued that if the teachers want to delink themselves from the two teachers’ union, they should ensure that they adhere to the stipulated guidelines while embarking on forming their own independent outfits.

“JSS teachers are naturally our members. We are welcoming them to their home (Kuppet). But you know there is freedom of choice and people might choose not to join or to join. We don’t have any other union that takes care of post-primary teachers,” Nthurima said.

The deputy Secretary General was speaking at PCEA Nyamachaki in Nyeri town where he graced the Annual General Assembly for Kuppet Nyeri branch. The meeting was convened by the branch’s Executive Secretary Francis Wanjohi and other senior officials.

Freedom of association

“If there are some who want to form theirs (union), then they will have to meet certain thresholds for them to get registered. You cannot have a multiplicity of unions. But that one doesn’t mean to curtail their freedom of association,” Nthurima told journalists.

Led by their national chairman Omari Omari, the JSS teachers recently argued that Kuppet and Knut have not proved to be effective in addressing their issues and, hence, demanded to be allowed to operate independently.

Crime scenes

“Allow the JSS teachers to be independent, most schools are currently crime scenes where JSS teachers want to fight head teachers and head teachers want to fight our teachers,”Omari said in Nairobi during World Teachers’ Day luncheon organized by Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna.

Speaking separately, Ndung’u Wangenye – an educationist – said the JSS teachers have the right to form their own union, arguing that the JSS curriculum is a new segment in the education sector. Wangenye said their issues are unique compared to those of primary and secondary teachers.

“JSS teachers are at liberty to form their own union. The current demarcation in place is Knut to represent primary school teachers and Kuppet to represent secondary school teachers,”  Wangenye said.

“JSS is a new segment in the education sector. Their issues are also unique in nature. It is in order for them to have their own union as long as the registrar of trade unions and the national labour board approves such registration,” he added.

Wangenye, who is former Kuppet Laikipia branch Executive Secretary, said JSS teachers should be given their own command structure separately from that of primary school teachers.

“These are graduates and their training in university is to teach a combination of two subjects only. You cannot therefore bombard them like their counterparts in primary schools who are trained to teach everything unless there is a change of curriculum in their training in university,” he said.

JSS teachers want the government to formulate a streamlined command system on their management, arguing that the current system that places them under primary school head teachers is untenable.

Currently, the teachers are operating under primary school head teachers whereas the junior schools are domiciled.