The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) fired a secondary school teacher over a degree dispute emanating from school fee arrears.
The teacher, Joseph Mutimba had allegedly received his degree certificate from Masinde Muliro University (MMUST) without clearing his fees amounting to Ksh198,800. This raised questions from the institution as to how the teacher gained access to his certificate while still having fee arrears.
The Kakamega based university then went ahead to cancel his Bachelor of Education (Arts) degree and soon after, his employer TSC suspended him.
Mutimba filed a lawsuit against the university for violation of his rights under Article 28 of the Constitution.
"Every person has inherent dignity and the right to have that dignity respected and protected," the constitution reads. High Court Judge William Musyoka did agree to his claims but declined to award him damages on grounds that he failed to explain how the degree certificate came into his possession.
“The petitioner (Mutimba) has not come clean on how he gained possession of the certificate after it disappeared from the custody of the respondent (MMUST),” the judge said in a decision delivered on October 16 this year.
Justice Musyoka added that it was inappropriate for the university to contact the TSC alleging that the certificate he had used to seek employment was fake, given that Mutimba had passed all his examinations and graduated. The university stated in court that his name was erroneously included in the graduation list although he had not finished paying school fees.
Mutimba, who graduated on December 6, 2013, explained to the court that he got hired by TSC in November 2016 but the tide shifted when he received a letter from the university in May 2019 canceling his degree certificate.
Upon inquiry from his employer, he was informed that his salary had been stopped following a communication from the university over his fee arrears. Mutimba was among a group of fee defaulters whose names were published by the university, indicating that their degree certificates had been withdrawn.
The court said TSC made it clear that a reprint of the same certificate with a new serial number would not resolve the matter since Mutimba had been employed on the basis of the old certificate. The court gave a directive that for Mutimba to get back his job, he ought to get a new degree certificate with a fresh serial number.
Mutimba's legal scuffle with the local university ensued from the institution revoking his degree and failing to reinstate it. He filed a suit at the Employment and Labour Relations Court and in March 2019, an order was issued barring TSC from withholding his salary.
In October 2019, the court found that Mutimba had met all academic requirements and had graduated, but declined to grant orders sought in the case because of the fee arrears claim. The university had initially offered to reprint the old document which was rejected by the TSC.
The teacher then filed an application before the High Court, challenging MMUST's decision to reprint. In its response, the university claimed that Mutimba had trouble paying fees, and often sought late registration of examinations. The teacher's name was included in the graduation list but the university withheld his degree certificate until the fee arrears were settled.
Sometime in June 2015, however, MMUST reported to the police that Mutimba's degree certificate had gone missing which prompted the university to revoke his documents. It is alleged that Mutimba sought for employment from the TSC with a stolen degree certificate from the university.
