Formers employees of the Keya Railways corporation on Monday held a protest at the Company headquarters in Nairobi.
The workers marched to MD Philip Mainga’s office and demanded his addresses them.
They chant, “ Wooooooiiii…………….They have eaten our money, deprived us of our rights. We are entitled to shs 3,000 monthly pension but for five months, we have received nothing. Thugs are full in public offices and they are swindling our hard-earned cash as we suffer,”
“We have suffered for long and today …we must get our rights. Our old men are dying and yet the shs 3,000 pension they cannot get. Railways is what it is because of us,” he sung.
The protesters said the Railways MD should intervene and correct the mess in the company running their scheme.
He protests were dispersed by police.
Some insiders said the protest had been sponsored to taint the image of the MD.
Others said most the senior employees at Railways are in acting capacity and have not been confirmed as substantive heads of departments.
“We are siffering here. Some of us especially the casuals have not been paid,” said a female employee who sought anonymity.
Other employees blamed the National Government for the mess at Railways saying employees have also gone for months without salaries because treasury has not dispersed cash to several parastatals.
“It’s not just Kenya Railways, most parastatals have been forced to use development money to pay salaries because of delayed disbursement.,” another employee said.
Last year, pensioners from Nyanza region called for the overhaul of the parastatal’s staff retirements benefit scheme board for failing its members.
They said the scheme is on the verge of collapse.
They said the scheme owed its members over Sh.450 million in unpaid monthly pensions, adding that they had not been paid any money for the past six months.
Speaking on behalf of the Former Kenya Railways Workers Association (FOKERAWA), the Nyanza Regional Coordinator, James Aggrey Oduor called for an audit of the scheme’s transactions, saying that it was shrouded in secrecy.
He said the then board had messed up the scheme, making its members to wallow in abject poverty.
“The scheme is being mismanaged by a few individuals making Kenya Railways retirees to wallow in poverty, despite it being one of the richest schemes in East and Central Africa,” he said.
Oduor accused the board of trustees of secretly disposing off the scheme’s assets without the consent of the members.
Flanked by the organization’s National Organizing Secretary, James Kanyeki, Oduor said most of their members were dying for lack of money for their daily upkeep, despite having served diligently fir the corporation during its “hey days”
“We have no option but to overhaul the board and start afresh,” he said then.
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