The proposal to change the terms of employment for civil servants is in high gear following the latest draft report released by the Public Service Ministry.
In the draft report titled Public Service Transformation Strategy, 2024-2029, all civil servants will be assigned Unified Payroll Numbers (UPNs) to all cadres of staff for ease of management.
The numbers will be linked to the Integrated Persons Registry Systems (IPRS) civil registration system as well as the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) system to eliminate the manual payroll system.
The strategy is part of the government's mandate to ensure value for money in the delivery of government services and seek ways of reducing the bloated wage bill which currently stands at 47 per cent of ordinary revenues.
This will also include changing terms of employment from permanent terms to fixed-term contracts whereby their continuity in the public sector will be based on their performance.
According to the draft report, all public sector payrolls will henceforth be processed through the unified Human Resources Management Information System (HRMIS).
The timeframe for the project to commence is within the first year upon the approval of the draft report.
The procedure will entail conducting a payroll audit across all Ministries, Departments, Agencies, and Counties to identify any irregularities.
A comprehensive report will be compiled, detailing the number of government ministries and departments with clean payrolls. This report will be uploaded onto the unified Human Resource Management Information System (HRMIS).
Additionally, revisions will be made to the Public Finance Management regulations to determine sanctions for non-compliance with the recommendations outlined in the draft reports.
Furthermore, a wage bill forecasting tool will be developed to facilitate effective decision-making regarding salaries and allowances. This tool is slated to be implemented one year after the rollout of the Unified Payroll Number (UPN).
CS Kuria is tasked with drafting a report to present to the Cabinet for approval of the proposed plans. Should the Cabinet endorse the initiative, civil servants will no longer be entitled to benefits such as pensions, insurance premiums, and other government employee privileges.
During the announcement, the Public Service CS underscored that the strategy aims to reduce the country's wage bill, highlighting that half of the nation's revenue is currently allocated to paying salaries for approximately one million public servants.
