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| Youths demonstrating in Nairobi: www.africareview.com |
The Kenyan government has been telling millions of Jobless
youth that it cannot hire them because it has no vacancies and can’t afford to
pay more people. But the youth have seen an opportunity.
Sometimes in September, the government ordered a biometric
registration of staff both in the National Government and County Governments. The
exercise unearthed a major scam as more than 12,500 workers failed to turn up
for the biometric exercise.
According to a report released by the Devolution and
Planning Cabinet Secretary, Anne Waiguru, of the 172,522 workers on the
national government’s payroll, only 160,012 turned up for biometric registration.
This means that the government has been losing billions of
shillings annually to non-existent workers, right?
Following the revelation, President
Uhuru Kenyatta gave an order to the Ethics and anti-corruption commission, the
Anti-Banking Fraud United and the CID to investigate the matter. This should be an easy job because the banks that
process payments on behalf of the government should be having data on how the
salaries were withdrawn and by who.
An opportunity for the Youth
Since the government had already budgeted for salaries of
the 12,510 ghost workers who, presumably, were hired on a needs basis, it
should not get rid of the positions, but rather employ some youth to fill them
up.
Hopefully, more jobs will come up once colluding civil
servants are identified, investigated, and sacked. In addition, most county
governments are yet to submit their reports but we are hopeful that more ghost
workers will be netted once those reports come in and this will translate to
more vacancies for the youth.
Here the Youth Out
The Kenyan civil service is dominated by technology-shy and
aged workers with very low academic qualifications. These mostly corrupt, Moi-era
workers have personalized the civil service, systematically locking out the
youth who are better trained, more transparent, and more tolerant to people
from other tribes. But hiring ghost workers to fill genuine positions is just
another thing.
Why should anyone hire ghost workers when the Country has
millions of qualified but jobless youth? You may wonder.
President Uhuru Kenyatta rode on the change platform to sail
to power and should do more to change the corrupt, Moi-era civil service and create more jobs for his friends – the youth.
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