Economy

Four regions control jobs at Kenya Power

power

A Kenya Power technician at work. FILE PHOTO | NMG

The big four ethnic groups dominate jobs at Kenya Power #ticker:KPLC, a new report shows, squeezing out the smaller communities from opportunities at the utility parastatal.

A Kenya Power report on its ethnic composition that was tabled in Parliament last week indicates that the four control 63.32 percent of the 10,980 jobs at the utility despite accounting for less than half of the Kenyan population.

Together they hold 6,953 jobs at Kenya Power, leaving the other 44 ethnic groups to share the remaining 4,027 slots, or 36.68 percent, of remaining positions.

Under the diversity policy for State Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) released in December 2015 by the Public Service Commission (PSC), ethnic groups whose job representation surpasses their corresponding national population proportion are considered to be over-represented.

The diversity policy was expected to tackle the problem of over-representation by setting hiring quotas for ethnic groups and disadvantaged classes such as the disabled.

The statistics indicate central Kenya is over-presented at Kenya Power as the region holds 2,786 jobs, or 25.37 percent of the slots against their 17.15 percent share of population based on 2009 Census.

The Rift Valley is over-represented by 2.94 percent, while Nyanza overshoot its population proportion by 2.79 percent, while the Kisii region is over-represented by 3.17 percent.

The four regions have since 1982 occupied the CEO position at the electricity distributor.

Chief executives of State- owned firms tend to influence the employment of cronies and kinsmen in the firms they head.

Mr Samuel Gichuru served for more than two decades at the helm of Kenya Power until 2003 and the post has since been occupied by Jasper Oduor, Zakary Ayieko, Joseph Njoroge, Ben Chumo and Ken Tarus.

The Western region, which forms 13.83 percent of the Kenyan population account for 12.06 percent of Kenya Power jobs, while lower Eastern is underrepresented by 0.77 percent.

Other underrepresented communities include the Somali who fall short of their population proportion by 3.38 percent, Mijikenda (1.22 percent), Meru (1.20 percent) and Maasai (1.52 percent).

The PSC had earlier proposed assigning recruitment or promotion quotas over a period of time in ministries and the state agencies to uplift the underrepresented communities.

The policy was a follow-up to the Public Service (Values and Principles) Act, 2015 which requires ethnic balance in the public service to make it reflect the face of Kenya by balancing the share in favour of smaller tribes historically marginalised.

The report shows Kenya Power has 50 disabled employees or 0.46 percent of the workforce.

Five communities control nearly three-quarters of the senior management team, with the remainder of the senior positions held by 11 other ethnic groups.