Public Service is employer of choice

Kenya’s public service has overtaken the private sector as the employer of choice due to hefty salaries and allowances offered by the government, a new study shows.

This has seen professionals quit the private sector to join the civil service, parastatals and constitutional commissions, which offer better pay, says the report by the Kenya Institute for Public Policy Research and Analysis (Kippra).

The exodus is fuelled by the string of stipends offered to public service workers, which include housing, medical, transport, entertainment, responsibility, hardship and extraneous allowances.

Public service is also preferred against private sector because it does not place heavy demands on productivity and performance.

“The Kenyan public service is generally a better employer than the private sector and this is attributable to the practice of paying multiple allowances in the public sector,” said John Omiti, executive director of Kippra.

“This is fuelling the wage bill and denies the private sector the expertise required to drive growth.”

The study was released Thursday and was carried out by Kippra on behalf of the Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC).

Kippra says a Bachelor’s degree holder working in the public service earns an average of Sh83,629, which is almost double the Sh47,968 first degree holders make in the private sector.

SRC chairperson Sarah Serem said the lure to work for the government was due to the fact that the public service does not match pay to productivity unlike the private sector that is strict on performance measurement.

“In the public service, productivity is really wanting yet the wage bill has been going up,” noted Ms Serem.

Kenya’s public wage bill has doubled over the last five years to reach Sh458.7 billion as at June last year, which is equivalent to 12.2 per cent of GDP, due to frequent reviews of pay and allowances.

The research by Kippra shows that a cut in the public wage bill by one per cent of GDP will lead to taxpayers saving about Sh76 billion in two years, funds that can be channelled to development projects.

This is enough money to build two additional superhighways or a Level 5 hospital in each county.

There are an estimated 615,000 government employees including those in the civil service, teachers, parastatal workers and companies majority-owned by the State.

Kippra projects Kenya’s wage bill will grow 13.5 per cent to Sh521 billion or 12.5 per cent of GDP in the fiscal year ending June 2014.