House team to probe cash cri**s in varsities
The committee on education is set to commence an investigation into the status of universities in Kenya after it emerged that they have accrued debts worth billions of shillings.
The committee chaired by Tinderet MP Julias Melly will also be expected to recommend ways in which the institutions can be restructured to bring them back to solvency.
The probe came after Deputy Speaker Gladys Shollei asked the committee to probe the matter following a question by Kamukunji MP Yusuf Hassan.
Hassan, in the statement, regretted that universities have been grappling with financial challenges and need urgent interventions.
He said the recent anouncement by the government pointing to a blanket withdrawal of funding to universities, would paralyze tertiary education.
Hassan asked: “What steps are taken by the government to financially evaluate and audit all public universities to ascertain the extent of their debt burden?”
In his statement, Hassan said it was regrettable that in the recent past, universities have been struggling to survive as they even unable to honour statutory obligations — including remittances to Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA), National Hospital Insurance Fund (NHIF), National Social Security Fund (NSS) and payment of wages and debts due to banks, contractors and suppliers.
He regretted that, owing to the acute financial crisis, the University of Nairobi, for instance, was recently forced to raise tuition and accommodation fees, while, Egerton University is facing a shutdown after industrial action by its lecturers and staff over unpaid salaries. Others such as Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture, Moi, Turkana, Technical University of Kenya (TUK), Karatina and Multi-Media universities, are fairing no better.
An internal report by the Ministry of Education recently raised the red flag on the future of public universities which are struggling with huge costs and debts.
