Mutyambai Bows to Pressure in Salary Row With Graduate Police Officers

Inspector-General of Police Hillary Mutyambai has assured to look into the needs of 1000 graduate police officers whose November salaries were slashed resulting in an uproar.

Mutyambai has since directed all regional police commanders to submit data on all the graduate police officers within the ranks.

According to reports, the lists are to be submitted by today, November 29, 2021, before President Uhuru Kenyatta attends the passing-out parade for 2,610 recruits at the National Police Training College in Embakasi.

“Urgently submit a list of graduate officers of other ranks from your respective commands. Your replies to reach this headquarters in excel format by November 29 at noon without fail,” states the memo.

An officer who spoke to the Nation revealed that the move by Mutyambai could bring a solution to the problem.

“I don’t know why it’s a big fight with graduates yet the majority in the service are beneficiaries of the same kind of promotions. If the move to shift graduate constables from job Group F to J was illegal, why don’t they demote all officers in other ranks that were promoted using the same criteria?” The officer posed.

In the said salary cuts, the officers, who have been earning Group J ‘Inspector of Police’ salaries under the designation ‘graduate constables’, received Group F salaries, which are equivalent to the salary of police constables.

According to reports, many of them had committed percentages of their salaries to servicing loans and other statutory deductions.

The salary cuts thus mean that they are unable to meet their monthly basic requirements of rent, food and upkeep as their payslips are reading salaries as low as Kh53, Kh18, up to negative Kh7000.

Their payslips show that at Job Group J, the officers were earning basic salaries of Ksh59,000 but only Ksh32,000 remitted to their accounts. Their house allowance was slashed to Ksh9,000 from Ksh24,000, and risk allowance from Ksh11,000 to Ksh9,000.

The downgrade affected officers from all formations, including the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI). This has raised fears that many of them could engage in crime to supplement their income.

Police Spokesperson Bruno Shioso said the slashing of salaries was informed by the Court of Appeal ruling No 352 of 2019 that was delivered on September 23.

“That, unfortunately, is the position that we must respect and enforce. I empathise with the affected officers since no one can bear diminished earning capacity. That said, this is a legal and policy issue rather than an administrative one. It’s also a cross-cutting issue affecting the National Police Service Commission (employer), NPS, salaries and remuneration commission, Judiciary and the Treasury,” he said.

The 1000 police officers have since threatened to sue the National Police Service (NPS) over the salary cuts.